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Installing, uninstalling, or updating software packages has always been a simple process in Red Hat Linux due to the widespread use of the Red Hat Package Manager (RPM). Instead of using a standard TAR archive, software is packaged in a special archive for use with RPM. An RPM archive contains all the program files, configuration files, data files, and even documentation that constitute a software application. With one simple operation, the Red Hat Package Manager installs all these for you. It also checks for any other software packages that the program may need to run correctly. You can even create your own RPM packages. Red Hat provides an RPM window-based tool called redhat-config-packages to manage your RPM packages, installing new ones and updating or uninstalling ones you already have. The redhat-config-packages tool provides an easy-to-use interface for managing your packages, enabling you to obtain detailed information on a package easily, including a complete listing of the files it installs.
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You can update Red Hat Fedora Core Linux using Yum and APT repositories such as the Red Hat Rawhide depository, accessible with the Red Hat Update Agent, RHN (see Chapter 4). You can also use Yum tools to download from different Red Hat software repositories (linux.duke.edu/projects/yum). New releases can be downloaded from rpmfind's BitTorrent ISO service (rpmfind.net/BitTorrent). |
You can also download source code versions of applications, and then compile and install them on your system. Where this process once was complex, it has been significantly streamlined with the addition of configure scripts. Most current source code, including GNU software, is distributed with a configure script. The configure script automatically detects your system configuration and generates a Makefile, which is used to compile the application and create a binary file that is compatible with your system. In most cases, with a few Makefile operations, you can compile and install complex source code on any system.
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