Few suggestions
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| krisum Oct 03, 2008 7:10 AM EDT |
Nice article for new users. A few inaccuracies: * Its not true that RPM "does not care about dependencies". RPM does resolve all the dependency information just that it does not automatically download and install missing dependencies like yum. * The wildcards in yum search are not regular expression patterns rather shell style glob patterns. * Regarding aptitude's feature of removing any unneeded dependencies automatically, it is also available in apt-get now though I do not know how to explicitly mark a package as manual/automatic like one can do in aptitude. Just to mention here that the current incarnation of "RPM hell" is the issue of incompatible RPMs between distros i.e. you just can't install an RPM for another distro and expect it to work. Though the same holds for debs to some extent, it is still mostly limited to two major camps (debian, ubuntu) and other deb based distros work with one or other. Some suggestions: * You may want to add some information about repoquery which is part of yum-utils. It has most of the options of rpm -q, just that it works with all packages in yum repositories instead of only the installed ones. For example I find "repoquery --whatrequires", "repoquery --list" useful among others. * When using aptitude search, I find it preferable to use "~d" prefix (e.g. aptitude search '~dfoo') to also search the package descriptions -- without this it only searches in the package names which is not too useful many a times. * You can also mention apt-cache which can do more than simple search (though aptitude can do most of it in full screen mode). |
| rijelkentaurus Oct 03, 2008 7:47 AM EDT |
As a user of RPM-based distros: 1 - Use the format "rmp --test -Uvh foo.rpm" to test out the package to see if there are dependencies or other errors before actually installing it. Use of the -U option will also update a package that is already there, or will install a new package. Kinda like -i, but a bit more power. Running --test is also useful when you are installing RPMs from different distros, like Fedora RPMs in CentOS, or Mandriva RPMs in PCLOS...just because they are from different distros, that doesn't mean they're not compatible, but be sure. 2 - To get rid of a package you installed via RPM (although it will still usually show up in YUM or Synaptic), use "rpm -e foo.rpm", after running "rpm -qa | grep -i foo" (this will get you the full package name, which RPM will want, like "foo-0.1.2.5-e-bar.rpm". 3 - To install multiple RPM files in a directory at once without having to worry about which RPM file depends on another to be installed (most likely, this means you are installing OOo from the downloaded package from Sun), use "rpm -Uvh *.rpm", and it should sort that out for you, assuming there are no missing RPM dependencies. But if you followed step 1 you'll know what those are before actually installing. |
| jdixon Oct 03, 2008 11:56 AM EDT |
> As a user of RPM-based distros: We feel your pain. :) |
| rijelkentaurus Oct 03, 2008 12:52 PM EDT |
LOL, it ain't like it used to be, though. With Mandriva's software list and the PLF repos, about the only thing I have to add to this is Citrix (for work) and VMWare Workstation. Otherwise, it's as painless as Debian, with a few less packages. |
| tracyanne Oct 03, 2008 5:45 PM EDT |
@jd what rijel said. I haven't had any problems with RPM dependencies for a long time. |
| jdixon Oct 03, 2008 6:09 PM EDT |
> I haven't had any problems with RPM dependencies for a long time. I haven't heard too many people complaining about rpm problems in a couple of years now, so I'd guess the problems have been pretty well resolved. They were fairly common there for a while though, especially for Red Hat and closely related distro's (I think Mandriva, then Mandrake, had already diverged enough not be stuck with Red Hat's problems). Of course, my distro of choice has never used rpm, so I've never had the problem. :) |
| tuxchick Oct 03, 2008 6:31 PM EDT |
Thanks for good suggestions, and the RPM hell whining does continue- pundits and analysts still have some catching up to do. |
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