rsync and rawhide

[Kevin Fenzi]

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>>>>> "Chris" == Chris Ricker <kaboom at gatech.edu> writes:

Chris> On Fri, 17 Oct 2003, Kevin Fenzi wrote:
>> Someone the other day was telling me that with updates for SuSe you
>> could pull down all the new rpms, or just pull down changes between
>> the updated rpm and your current version...
>> 
>> Ah, there they are... called 'patch rpms'.  From:
>> 
>> http://www.suse.com/us/private/download/updates/90_i386.html
>> 
>> "New: Patch RPMs
>> 
>> As of now we are offering so called Patch RPM packages. A Patch RPM
>> updates an already installed RPM. It only contains files which have
>> changed - therefore it is (much) smaller than the complete RPM
>> package. Prerequisite for installation is an already installed
>> basic RPM. The packages included on the SUSE LINUX 9.0-CDs/DVD are
>> considered as basic RPMs.  If you want to update an already
>> installed package, please download the smaller Patch RPM package."
>> 
>> Something like this would be very handy for keeping up with
>> rawhide, saving redhat bandwith, and making more people use it as
>> it became smaller/faster/easer to do.
>> 
>> Anyone know how they do those? Would that be hard to implement?

Chris> Interesting. Looking at just one patch.rpm,

Chris> ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/suse/i386/update/9.0/rpm/i586/bluez-bluefw-1.0-68.i586.patch.rpm

Chris> Dumping the rpm contents shows it contains just a single file
Chris> (the one which needed to be changed)

Chris> rpm -qlp on the patch.rpm, however, lists it as containing all
Chris> the files which are normally in the bluez-bluefw package

Chris> I guess when it gets installed, it leaves the old files on,
Chris> replaces the one which needs fixing, then registers in rpmdb? I

Yeah, that looks to be the case... 

so this 'patch.rpm' is newer than the version you have installed. It
'upgrades' to it, which just changes the one file leaving the others
in place just as they were, and now the rpm database has that version
as the installed version. 

Chris> wonder what happens if you rpm -e the patch? Do you go back to
Chris> the original package, or do you uninstall the whole package?

uninstall the entire package I would think. 

Chris> Looking at the spec file for the rpm, I see no evidence of how
Chris> the patch.rpm is generated....

Yeah, not much info on it. ;( 

Chris> At any rate, this on one level at least seems like a bad idea
Chris> to me. One of the nice things about managing Linux (versus
Chris> other Unixen) is that on most major Linux distros patch
Chris> management and software management are the same thing --
Chris> patches are just new versions of existing packages, and you
Chris> install, track, etc. the way you do any packages. That's better
Chris> than the usual "one set of tools to manage packages, another to
Chris> manage bugfixes to packages".... The patch.rpm's seem a bit of
Chris> a step backwards, at least in that respect.

Well, the would still use rpm or whatever package management, just
would require less download time. Without the infrastructure that Suse
has setup for it tho, it would take a while to implement. 

I guess we are back to rsync and clever re-naming for now. 

Chris> later, chris

kevin

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