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RPM in the context of package management refers to two things: a software package file format, and the original tool developed to manage those packages ('''RPM Package Manager''', originally called "Red Hat Package Manager"). RPM was primarily intended for Linux . The package management tool RPM installs, updates, uninstalls, verifies and queries Software . The file format RPM is the baseline package format of the Linux Standard Base . Originally developed by Red Hat for Red Hat Linux , RPM is now used by many Linux Distribution s. It has also been ported to some other Operating System s such as Novell NetWare (since version 6.5 SP3) and IBM AIX since version 5, see RPM homepage for all supported platforms. "RPM", as it is used today, is an example of a Recursive Acronym . THE FILE FORMAT THE RPM DATABASE Working behind the scenes of package manager is the RPM database. It consists of a Doubly-linked List that contains all information for all installed packages. The database keeps track of all files that are changed and created when a user installs a program and can therefore very easily remove the same files. If the database gets corrupted (which happens easily if the RPM client is Kill ed), the double links ensure that it can often be rebuilt without any trouble. On Red Hat systems the database is stored in /var/lib/rpm.PACKAGE LABEL Every RPM package has a ''package label'', which contains the following pieces of information:
and the RPM file would normally have the following format: An example: nano-0.98-2.i386.rpm However, note that package label is contained within the file and does not necessarily need to match the name of the file. Source code may also be distributed in RPM packages. Such package labels do not have an architecture part and replace it with "src". E.g.: libgnomeuimm2.0-2.0.0-3.src.rpm Additionally, libraries are distributed in two separate packages for each version. One containing the precompiled code and one containing the development files such as header files etc. for the library in question. Those packages have "-devel" appended to their name field. Users need to carefully check so that the version of the development package matches that of the binary package, otherwise the library may very well not work. RPM files with the noarch.rpm extension refer to files which do not depend on a certain computer's architecture. These files usually include graphics and text for another program to use. ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF THE FORMAT Advantages of using RPM packages over other ways to acquire and install software often cited are:
Disadvantages often cited include:
RPM has also been criticized for a lack of consistency in package names and content, which can make automatic dependency handling difficult. However, this is not a problem inherent in the RPM ''format'', but rather a problem of co-ordination amongst major or Apt (see below). A tool exclusively for Mandriva Linux is Urpmi , and can help with the so called ' Dependency Hell '. CREATING RPMS The "recipe" for creating an RPM package is a spec file. Spec files end in the ".spec" extension and contain the package name, version, RPM revision number, steps to build, install, and clean a package, and a changelog. Multiple packages can be built from a single RPM spec file, if desired. RPM packages are created from RPM spec files using the rpmbuild tool. SUPPORTED LINUX DISTRIBUTIONS Several Linux distributions support RPM. These include, but are not limited to:
(''See also'': List Of Linux Distributions .) RELATED TOOLS There are several front ends to RPM that resolve dependencies. The best-known ones are:
See Also: archive formats package management system EXTERNAL REFERENCES AND LINKS
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