[Yum] "update" versus "install"

[seth vidal]

On Sat, 2003-10-25 at 06:26, Robert P. J. Day wrote:
>   i'm a little puzzled over the documented behaviour of the yum "update"
> option and what it's actually supposed to do.  are all variations of "yum
> update" only supposed to update existing RPMs on your ssystem?
> 


if you run yum update, and you specify a package that is not installed
anywhere then there are two possible types of behavior

if tolerant=1(config file) or -t is set (commandline) then yum will say,
'oh you don't have that package around to update, but I'll install it
for you'

if tolerant=0 or -t is not set then yum will say, 'oh you don't have
that package installed, too bad'

tolerant=1 means 'be tolerant about user's not knowing what they have
installed.'

>   as an example, i added matthias' ayo.freshrpms.net repository to
> /etc/yum.conf.  now i know he has several xine-related RPMs there, and i
> have *nothing* xine-related on my system.
> 
>   so let's say i type
> 
> # yum list updates
> 
> this should give me the list of all possible updates for my system, but
> should *not* mention xine, since i have no current version, it shouldn't
> be considered as a potential update, right?
> 
> and "yum update" i assume should work the same way -- updates can only be
> considered for RPMs that already exist on my system. and yet the yum man
> page reads:
> 
>   update  If run without any packages, update will update every currently
>               installed package.  If one or more packages are  specified,  Yum
>               will  only update the listed packages.  While updating packages,
>               yum will ensure that all  dependencies  are  satisfied. If no
>               package  matches  the given package name(s), they are assumed to
>               be a shell glob and any matches are then installed.  <--- ??
> 

> or am i just overdiscussing things again? :-)

yes - the behavior is consistent with what 90% of people expect and I
can't imagine anyone is going to read all the docs before ever running a
command. I've never met a single human being who does this.

-sv