Complete Idiot's Guide to Linux:Installing Programs and Applications function GetCookie (name) { var arg = name + "="; var alen = arg.length; var clen = document.cookie.length; var i = 0; while (i < clen) { var j = i + alen; if (document.cookie.substring(i, j) == arg) { var end = document.cookie.indexOf (";", j); if (end == -1) end = document.cookie.length; return unescape(document.cookie.substring(j, end)); } i = document.cookie.indexOf(" ", i) + 1; if (i == 0) break; } return null; } var m1=''; var gifstr=GetCookie("UsrType"); if((gifstr!=0 ) && (gifstr!=null)) { m2=gifstr; } document.write(m1+m2+m3);            Keyword Title Author ISBN Publisher Imprint Brief Full  Advanced      Search  Search Tips Please Select ----------- Components Content Mgt Certification Databases Enterprise Mgt Fun/Games Groupware Hardware IBM Redbooks Intranet Dev Middleware Multimedia Networks OS Prod Apps Programming Security UI Web Services Webmaster Y2K ----------- New Titles ----------- Free Archive To access the contents, click the chapter and section titles. Complete Idiot's Guide to Linux (Publisher: Macmillan Computer Publishing) Author(s): Manuel Ricart ISBN: 078971826x Publication Date: 12/22/98 function isIE4() { return( navigator.appName.indexOf("Microsoft") != -1 && (navigator.appVersion.charAt(0)=='4') ); } function bookMarkit() { var url="../../../../../www.itknowledge.com/PSUser/EWBookMarks.html@url="+window.location+"&isbn=0"; parent.location.href=url; //var win = window.open(url,"myitk"); //if(!isIE4()) // win.focus(); } Search this book:   Previous Table of Contents Next A Database of Installed Software The most interesting feature in RPM is the capability to query information about files and packages installed on your system. This feature is killer as you can query RPM to search its list of installed software for a number of things. Querying (searching) takes place using the -q option. Finding Information About the Package To find information about a package file, do an rpm query for information about the package. You would type the following: rpm -qip packagefile [alberto@digital alberto]$ rpm -qip DUMP-0_4.RPM Name : dump Distribution: OpenLinux 1.2 Version : 0.4b4 Vendor: Caldera, Inc. Release : 1 Build Date: Wed Jan 07 01:15:34 1998 Install date: (not installed) Build Host: → buildmeister.caldera.com Group : Administration/Archiving Source RPM: dump-0.4b4-→1. src.rpm Size : 295767 Packager : Raymund Will <[e-mail]> Summary : BSD dump/restore backup system (BETA). Description : dump and restore, as known from BSD/SunOS/..., is a quite reliable method for backup, because ‘dump’ gets all needed information directly from the storage media -- not via the high-level filesystem-interface (as tar, cpio, etc. do). Additionally the output format of dump is readable on other platforms (like SunOS, BSD) and vice versa. But BEWARE, this software is still under development (BETA)!!! Don’t rely too much on it -- but without testing, there would be no further improvement! Interleave with another backup method would be a good idea. Finding the Package that Owns a File If you want to find out what package a file came from, type this: rpm -q -f filepath [alberto@digital alberto]$ rpm -q -f /sbin/restore dump-0.4b4-1 Finding Files that are Owned by a Package To see all the files owned by a package, just enter the following: rpm -q -l packagename [alberto@digital alberto]$ rpm -q -l dump /etc/dumpdates /etc/rmt /sbin/dump /sbin/rdump /sbin/restore /sbin/rmt /sbin/rrestore /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1 /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/CHANGES /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/COPYRIGHT /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/KNOWNBUGS /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/THANKS /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/TODO /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/dump-0.4b1.announce /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/dump.lsm /usr/man/man8/dump.8.gz /usr/man/man8/rdump.8.gz /usr/man/man8/restore.8.gz /usr/man/man8/rmt.8.gz /usr/man/man8/rrestore.8.gz Finding Documentation Related to a Package Say you want to learn all sources of documentation that were installed with a particular package. RPM can help here too. Just type the following: rpm -q -d packagename [alberto@digital alberto]$ rpm -q -d dump /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1 /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/CHANGES /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/COPYRIGHT /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/KNOWNBUGS /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/THANKS /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/TODO /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/dump-0.4b1.announce /usr/doc/dump-0.4b4-1/dump.lsm /usr/man/man8/dump.8.gz /usr/man/man8/rdump.8.gz /usr/man/man8/restore.8.gz /usr/man/man8/rmt.8.gz /usr/man/man8/rrestore.8.gz Now you know what to read for your package! Verifying Your System Many times you might need the ability to check a file or an application, or even your entire system for signs of corruption. RPM keeps track of a checksum (a fancy calculation yielding a unique number that can be used to determine if a file’s contents change). By issuing a simple command (rpm -Va) you can verify your entire system! If RPM prints something, more than likely that package needs to be reinstalled. If you don’t see any messages, the verification process succeeded. Specifying rpm -Vf will verify just a single file. Note that some configuration files you modify will be listed, but this is normal. To compare an installed package against a package file, you would type rpm -Vp fullpackagename, as in the following example rpm -Vp mypackage-1.0-4.i386.rpm Graphical Front Ends to RPM A couple of graphical front ends to RPM are available: One is part of the KDE environment and is called kpackage (kpackage-0.9.02-1.i386.rpm; see the next figure), the other is called glint (glint-2.3-3.rpm). Although having a UI version of the program is a step in the right direction, the command line tool provides many features that are not accessible through the UI. For this reason, I am covering the command line version of the program instead. Here’s a screenshot of the kpackage tool. It provides a nice front end for installing RPM packages; however, it lacks many of the powerful querying facilities that the RPM program offers. Previous Table of Contents Next Products |  Contact Us |  About Us |  Privacy  |  Ad Info  |  Home Use of this site is subject to certain Terms & Conditions, Copyright © 1996-2000 EarthWeb Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of EarthWeb is prohibited.