missing packages

[Kevin J. Cummings]

On 11/13/2010 06:08 PM, JD wrote:
> On 11/13/2010 12:56 PM, Kam Leo wrote:
>> On Sat, Nov 13, 2010 at 12:11 PM, JD <jd1008 at gmail.com 
>> <mailto:jd1008 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>
>>     On 11/13/2010 11:48 AM, fred smith wrote:
>>     > On Sat, Nov 13, 2010 at 10:56:31AM -0800, JD wrote:
>>     >> yum check
>>     >> reports missing packages.
>>     >> Is there a way to yum install missing packages
>>     >> without having to specify their names?
>>     > I suppose you could capture to a file, the list yum gives of missing
>>     > packages, then edit the file til it looks like a yum
>>     commandline, then
>>     > run it.
>>     >
>>     Yeah   I know that.
>>     I was hoping that there is an incantation of yum
>>     or a package manager to go and fetch and install
>>     missing packages.
>>     Thanx for the suggestion.
>>
>>
>> If the missing packages are dependencies and are available they will 
>> be automatically pulled in when you run yum.
> I did yum update and yum says:
> .
> .
> .
> Setting up Update Process
> No Packages marked for Update

yum check

lists the packages that you have installed that do not have all of their
required dependencies installed.

How can this be?  One possibility that pops to mind is that you have
some "old" packages installed of which their dependencies have been
upgraded, but your "old" packages list the dependencies as ='s installed
of >='s.  This seems to be a rather common problem with certain
packages, and make updating them problematic.

It happens.  I have a couple of f12 packages on my (now) f14 laptop that
require (for example) python-abi = 2.6.  But, Python on f14 is now 2.7.

Your choices at this point are limited:

1)  remove the old packages with the dependency problems.  If you cannot
find current packages, maybe you can rebuild them from source.

2)  assume that the old packages will work with the newer versions of
its dependencies.  (Always a risk.)

3)  find/install the old dependencies.  (I do not recommend this option
except as a last resort, as there is no guarantee that the old
dependencies and the newer version of them can co-exist, and it may
require you to "force" some installations leading to further database
problems down the road).

-- 
Kevin J. Cummings
kjchome at rcn.com
cummings at kjchome.homeip.net
cummings at kjc386.framingham.ma.us
Registered Linux User #1232 (http://counter.li.org)