On Friday 09 July 2004 09:13, superbeast wrote: > I have noticed that certain software packages have different rpm's > for the different distributions, and I was wondering why. If the > core of the OS is the same version, why the need to create separate > rpm's for SuSE, RedHat, Fedora, etc.? One of the biggest differences asside from library version requirements is the locations where distros decide to put stuff. Most now distros use macros for file locations so SRPM are more portable in that regard. The gotcha hear is patches that change the source code of the app to point to a specific location to look for something. Then you get to change the patch. :-) Look at: http://www.fedora.us/wiki/ReferenceMandrakeRPMMacros for Mandrake's macro setup for converting SRPMS to Fedora. There's other doc's with more info on the site about migrating RPMs from other distros to Fedora. I'm assuming other distros will have similar info burried somewhere. Google is your friend. The biggest stubling block I've run into in compiling SRPMS is not data locations (thanks to macros) but library version and package requirements. Usually the packager for a distro will specify the minimum or exact library version(s) that the distro originally shipped with. Often I've found that an older/different versions are sufficient, they appear to use their original shipping version(s) for convenience. Very often the software you are trying to compile doesn't require such a new version of a library. Check the software website for compile requirements. The gotcha is if the SRPM has distro supplied patches that make it dependant on a different version. The other gotcha is package requiremetns. Very often I've found that Mandrake breaks things up more than Fedora so instead of specifying "packagebasename-subpart" for Mandrake you can chage it to "packagebasename" and you're fine. Migrating RPMS is not easy and very frusterating at first but after beating your head against the sharp corner of a brick wall for sevreal hours you can usually figure out what needs to be done. I just managed to get Fecora Core 2's KDE 3.2.3 SRPMS to compile on Fedora Core 1. Whoohoo! Bug fixes for me! I found it easier to get Mandrak RPMS to compile right on FC1 than moving FC2 packages backwards. (Why don't I run FC2? I don't want to learn how to deal with new quirks while I'm in school. I'm happy with the ones I've got now. I'll wait for FC3 and Christmas break to upgrade. FC3 is due in Oct sometime) -- Christopher A. Gahlon There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those that understand binary and those that don't. _______________________________________________ TCLUG Mailing List - Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota Help beta test TCLUG's potential new home: http://plone.mn-linux.org Got pictures for TCLUG? Beta test http://plone.mn-linux.org/gallery tclug-list at mn-linux.org https://mailman.real-time.com/mailman/listinfo/tclug-list