yum: rpm_check_debug vs. depsolve: rhnlib needs python(abi) = 2.4

[Jon Ciesla]

> On Thu, Nov 01, 2007 at 09:56:20AM -0500, Jon Ciesla wrote:
>>
>> > On one of my systems (Fedora 7) I'm getting this error from yum
>> > update:
>> >
>> > ERROR with rpm_check_debug vs depsolve:
>> > Package rhnlib needs python(abi) = 2.4, this is not available.
>> > Transaction did not run.
>>
>> rhnlib is obsolete, and can be removed.
>
> Great.  So why didn't yum remove it for me?  Is there a missing
> obsoletes somewhere?  I guess packages that are already 2 years old
> shouldn't be expected to be handled via Obsoletes?
>
> Name        : rhnlib                       Relocations: /usr
> Version     : 2.0                               Vendor: Red Hat, Inc.
> Release     : 1.p24.3.1                     Build Date: Sat 17 Dec 2005
> 02:16:35 AM EST
> Install Date: Thu 23 Mar 2006 05:40:32 AM EST      Build Host:
> hs20-bc1-2.build.redhat.com
> Group       : Development/Libraries         Source RPM:
> rhnlib-2.0-1.p24.3.1.src.rpm
> Size        : 409632                           License: GPL
> Signature   : DSA/SHA1, Mon 06 Mar 2006 05:03:50 PM EST, Key ID
> b44269d04f2a6fd2
> Packager    : Red Hat, Inc. <http://bugzilla.redhat.com/bugzilla>
> URL         : http://rhn.redhat.com
> Summary     : Python libraries for the RHN project

Just because it's obsolete does not mean that another package will
Obsoletes: it.  I've seen this happen with a few pacakges on systems that
have been yum upgraded though many releases.  4Suite is a good example, on
a system that is currently F-7 and began life as RL-8.

If no package replaces it's functionality definitely, there's no good
reason why a package should Obsoletes: it.  I guess you could make an
argument that fedora-release could carry those sorts of things, but that
could limit what you could install on the system, if say you were using
another version of rhlib from elsewhere that worked with Python 2.5, then
the fedora-release that obsoleted rhlib would block installation of that
package.  See what I mean?

I expect that we(http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/SIGs/LiveUpgrade) might
want to find a way to deal with this, maybe not with Obsoletes, but
something inthe f-r.rpm %postinstall or something.  Maybe not.


-- 
novus ordo absurdum