rpm experiences [was: Backing up whole system]

[S P Arif Sahari Wibowo]

On Sun, 10 May 2009, Tom Horsley wrote:
> All I know about making rpms is that I searched the web for 
> simple instructions and found a link to a guide all kinds of 
> different pages pointed at as the simplest possible intro 
> document for building an rpm: It was a 97 page long pdf file. 
> I ran screaming into the night :-).

Really? I guess that website is not so good, then. I am pretty 
sure I am not reading 97 pages before creating my own rpm 
successfully. :-) I suggest start with another rpm close to the 
one you need, open the source, then modify the spec file to your 
need. Therefore you need read the documentation only for the 
items used in the spec file.

> With grim determination in their eyes they marched off to do 
> battle with the .deb packaging tools, then with amazement, 
> they emerged from their cubicles, having gotten the .deb 
> building down pat in a couple of hours.

AFAIK .deb file also lacking some capabilities of rpm, e.g. the 
one hit me before is that .deb file can only have 1 source file 
and 1 patch file, while rpm can have multiple source files and 
multiple patch files.

> I can only conclude there is something fundamentally wrong 
> with the simplicity factor in rpms :-).

It probably true, being more powerful tools may make it 
difficult to be simple at the same time. :-)

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