Rpm

Usefull links
rpm.org	The RPM Homepage
http://www.rpm.org/max-rpm/	Maximum RPM -- Taking the Red Hat Package Manager to the Limit

command line tips

get the total size used by rpm packages:

 rpm -qa --queryformat "%{SIZE}\n" | awk '{arg += $1} END{ printf "%d Mb\n", arg / 1048576 }'

verify all the installed packages:

 rpm -Va

what package does (e.g.) the nslookup command belong to?

 rpm -qf `which nslookup`

building tips

When you want to build rpm's make sure you ~/.rpmmacros file is more or less sane:

Example

 %packager       J Doe <johndoe@example.tv>
 %vendor         HomeMade
 %_topdir        /home/jdoe/rpmbuild
 %_tmppath       /home/jdoe/rpmbuild/tmp
 %debug_package  %{nil}

And the correct directories have to exist:

 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/RPMS
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/RPMS/i686
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/RPMS/i586
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/RPMS/athlon
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/RPMS/i486
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/RPMS/i386
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/RPMS/noarch
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/tmp
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/BUILD
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/SPECS
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/SRPMS
 ${HOME}/rpmbuild/SOURCES