[Philosophy] Rebuilding rpm packages with different configuration options

[Paul Howarth]

John Wendel wrote:
> The current thread "download srpms and rebuild package with other 
> options" has raised a few questions in my small brain that I hope will 
> stimulate an interesting discussion.
> 
> [1] If I rebuild and install a package, what keeps a later update from 
> destroying my version?

Nothing, unless you take precautions to prevent that from happening, 
such as by adding "exclude=package" lines to /etc/yum.conf

> [2] If the answer to [1] is "nothing", then why bother with a package 
> management system for this update?

It maintains dependencies that other packages may have for the package 
concerned, and it prevents the installation of other rpm packages that 
would have conflicting files with your package.

> [3] Why shouldn't I be able to update the RPM database manually (without 
> actually installing or updating software)?
> 
> I'd like to tell it that I have installed program "foobar version 99.9", 
> so when the package maintainers release version 99.8 it won't try to 
> update.

You'd also need to tell it the full list of files installed, including 
their ownership, permissions, timestamps etc., the full list of shared 
libraries that it provides, etc. It's easier just to build and rpm and 
install it.

> [4] I recently tried to yum remove "cups\*", I couldn't do it because of 
> the package dependencies. It seems that everything that can print has a 
> cups dependency. But really, things continue to work fine without cups, 
> so the dependency isn't real. It seems that the package dependency thing 
> is just broken. Comments ???

They are real. *Some* functionality of these packages will depend on 
cups, but perhaps not the functionality that you use.

> Maybe I should just learn how to use rpm ...

Good plan :-)

Paul.