location of source rpms

[Andreas Bach Aaen]

Tirsdag 10 oktober 2006 07:44 skrev Andreas Hanke:
> Andreas Bach Aaen schrieb:
> > Now how do I locate the matching source rpms?
>
> Which distribution and which channel type is that?

I use SUSE SLES10. This means that the installation CDs/DVD are in yast2 
format, while the updated rpm can be fetched via a script called yup, which 
provide the updates in rpm-md (yum?) format.
In SLES9 the updates where provided in a special yast format, but this is 
changed now. Strange that they only did this for the updates and not for the 
instalation CDs.

> Unfortunately, you might be unlucky for several reasons:
>
> - smart does not support source packages as far as I know;

Right. I just hopes that there was a toolset besides it, just as there are for 
yum.

> - some channel types have binary packages and source packages in
> different repositories;

This should be the case for the repository types in my case.

> - some channel types do not associate binary packages and source
> packages with each other.

That's a problem - and generally a unfortunate limitation. As both rpm files 
and deb files provide information about their source package, repositories 
should help with a structure to make these available. I surely hope that the 
repository types that supports location of source packages as well will 
survive in the stong Open Source competition.

Meanwhile I probably need to make a special script for handling this.
However it would be very helpfull if smart could provide me with a list of 
(source rpm URL, channel name or repository type). Providing the channel name 
will require that my script should be able to locate and parse the channel 
files as well, ehile providing the repository type will make my script able 
to locate the relative path to the source rpms. Maybe the root directory of 
the repository is needed as well, so the appropriate metadata files can be 
read.

In the case of yum, you have an utillity that can fetch the source rpm for 
you:
yumdownloader --source <rpm name>


In general I want it to be just as easy to get the source rpms for your 
system, as it is to install the binary rpms.

Regards,
-- 
Andreas Bach Aaen              System Developer, M. Sc. 
Ericsson Danmark A/S           tel: +45 89 38 51 00
Skanderborgvej 232             fax: +45 89 38 51 01
8260 Viby J      Denmark       andreas.bach.aaen at ericsson.com