Re: [tlug] RedHat up2date funnies

[Josh Glover <jmglov@example.com>]

Jim Tittsler wrote:
> On Tue, May 21, 2002 at 04:05:37PM +1000, Jim Breen wrote:
> 
>>I have rpm-4.0.2-8 installed (came with RH7.1) and up2date is trying to
>>put in rpm-4.0.4-7x. I downloaded that rpm from RH's site, but of course
>>it won't install, saying:
>>
>>error: failed dependencies:
>>        rpm = 4.0.2 is needed by rpm-python-4.0.2-8
>>        rpm = 4.0.2 is needed by rpm-build-4.0.2-8
>>        rpm = 4.0.2 is needed by rpm-devel-4.0.2-8
> 
> 
> Update them all at the same time.  Put the rpm-4.0.4-7x,
> rpm-python, rpm-build, rpm-devel in the same directory
> and then do:
>   rpm -Uvh rpm*
> If rpm is given a number of rpms to install at once it is
> clever enough to merge their 'provides' and 'requires'.

Quite a few people piped up with suggestions, and most of them were 
good. This is more of a summary than anything, but:

- I would not recommend using up2date. If you want something to provide 
up2date's functionality, try Ximian's Red Carpet. I personally just 
mirror the updates tree on ftp.redhat.com and have a shell script email 
me when new packages show up so I can decide if I need them or not. 
Another trick would be having a cron job that runs every day or so, 
doing an rpm -Fvh on the whole updates tree (this would upgrade only 
installed RPMs, as opposed to the -U flag).
- In general, you want to install multiple RPMs at the same time (i.e., 
in the same rpm command) as dependencies are more easily resolved (and 
less often circular).
- Do not be afraid of --nodeps, but use it as a last resort. I have 
found many times when I have had to use --nodeps and then symlink things 
by hand.

-Josh