[Yum] Yum "article"

Robert G. Brown rgb at phy.duke.edu
Wed Nov 19 12:49:46 UTC 2003


On Tue, 18 Nov 2003, Cliff Kent wrote:

> My FC1 client's yum.conf has this:
> 
> [base]
> name=Fedora Core 1 - Base
> baseurl=file:/mnt/net/rocketj/install-disks/FedoraCore/FC1

It's a quirk in what constitutes a well-formed file URL.  There are
three distinct forms (at least) that will be picked up as a file by at
least some browsers (and probably by urlgrabber).  In at least galeon:

  file:///path/to/file
  file:/path/to/file
  /path/to/file

all resolve to the local file at /path/to/file.  Galeon, at least,
rewrites this as the first, "properly formed" URL in the actual current
location and history. What won't work is:

  file://path/to/file

or

  file://./path/to/file

So it is entirely possible that

baseurl=/mnt/net/rocketj/install-disks/FedoraCore/FC1

would work as well, with no file: at all, although I haven't tried it.

The point is, of course, that the file component of a URL does not
inherit an implict "head" of /. (a root path), while a web or ftp
component does inherit the root path of the website, or rather, the
primary web address is a representation of the root path.

I made the observation in the article because I am aware of at least two
people who tried the file:// form by accident, probably because it
"looks like" http:// or ftp://.  I personally am not religious about the
formedness of URL's, but find it easy to get into trouble with leading
"/"'s and the kind of site you reach if you get in the habit of leaving
off http://, ftp://, file://.  Hence my endorsement of the latter form,
with leading /.

    rgb

> 
> It's an NFS mount (in fstab) of a lan directory with the RPMs from the 
> FC1 CDs.
> 
> I know how that yum.conf entry was created. I did a copy/paste from the 
> location in konqueror.
> 
> I wouldn't bother about it, except that /var/cache/yum/base/headers on 
> that client seems to have the proper list of headers for RC1 base. 
> Shouldn't I expect that directory to be empty if baseurl= was wrong? 
> And, it's updated and installed several times without trouble.
> 
> If it will help, that FC1 box is strictly for testing and I'd be happy 
> help if I can.
> 
> best,
> 
> Cliff Kent
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Yum mailing list
> Yum at lists.dulug.duke.edu
> https://lists.dulug.duke.edu/mailman/listinfo/yum
> 

-- 
Robert G. Brown	                       http://www.phy.duke.edu/~rgb/
Duke University Dept. of Physics, Box 90305
Durham, N.C. 27708-0305
Phone: 1-919-660-2567  Fax: 919-660-2525     email:rgb at phy.duke.edu






More information about the Yum mailing list