Update Agent provides a complete system for updating the RPM
packages installed on a Red Hat Linux system. Both command line and
graphical interfaces are included.
When you run Update Agent, you will be prompted for the computer's root
password. This is because Update Agent needs read/write access to the
RPM database, and it needs to be able to install packages when so
requested. It also needs read/write access to the up2date systemid
file in
/etc/sysconfig/rhn/systemid
, and it's configuration in
/etc/sysconfig/rhn/up2date
Update Agent has a quite a few configuration options, including but not
limited to: installing packages after they are downloaded; downloading
source RPMs along with binary RPMs; whether or not to upgrade packages
where the default configuration file(s) have been modified, and more.
You can change these settings through a graphical interface by running
up2date-config, or you can edit the configuration file
/etc/sysconfig/rhn/up2date
directly. A number of the command line arguments described below can
also be used at runtime to override configuration options. There
is also a text mode based configuration if invoked with with the
--configure option.
If you supply package names on the command line, those particular
packages will be updated or installed if there are new versions available.
Only the package name is needed, do not supply any version or release information.
If the package is not currently installed, it will be downloaded
and installed, along with any dependencies that package requires.
--configure
Configure Update Agent options. This will allow you to
adjust things such as which files/packages to skip by default, where to
store retrieved packages, and more.
-d, --download
download packages only, do not install them. This option is provided so
that you can override the configuration option "Do not install packages
after retrieval." It is mutually exclusive with the --install option.
--nodownload
Do not download packages at all. This is for testing purposes.
-f, --force
force package installation. This option is provided so that you can
override the file, package and configuration skip lists.
-i, --install
install packages after they are downloaded. This option is provided so
that you can override the configuration option "Do not install packages
after retrieval.". It is mutually exlusive with the the --download
option.
-l, --list
output a list of packages which have been updated and available for
retrieval/installation.
--showall
Show a list of all packages available for your release of
Red Hat Linux, including those not currently installed.
-k, --packagedir
Specify a colon seperated path of directories to look
for packages before attempting to download them.
--nosig
Do not use GPG to check package signatures (overrides configuration
option).
--src
Download source rpms as well as binary rpms.
--nosrc
Do not download source package (overrides configuration option).
-p, --packages
Update the packages associated with this System Profile on Red Hat
Network. Useful if you have installed, updated, or removed packages
without Update Agent, and your package list has become unsynchronized
with your remote Profile.
--whatprovides=<deps>
Queries the RHN servers to resolve the comma seperated list of
dependencies. It will return a list of packages that will satisfy
these deps.
--solvedeps=<deps>
Queries the RHN servers to resolve the comma seperated list
of dependencies. Essentially the same as --whatprovides
except it will also download and install the packages that are needed to
resolve the dependencies.
--show-channels
Show the channels associated with a package where approriate. If
used alone, it shows the currently subscribed channels. If used with
--showall or --whatprovides it will show channels as
well as package names.
--tmpdir=<directory>
allows you to override the configured package/temporary file storage
directory. This can be useful if you are about to download a lot of
packages but you do not have enough space to store them in the default
location.
--gpg-flags
Shows the flags that gpg will be invoked with (the keyring, the home
directory, etc). Intentend for useage in scripts that want to invoke
gpg the same way up2date does.
-u, --update
Completely update the system. All relevant packages will be downloaded
(and possibly installed, if you have configured Update Agent to do so).
--nox
do not even attempt to display the gui.
-h, --help
display help on command line arguments and exit.
-v, --verbose
print more information about what Update Agent is doing.
--justdb
only add packages to the database,do not install them to the filesystem.
--dbpath
Specify a path where an alternat rpm database to use is found.
--version
output version information and exit.
RETURN CODES
Update Agent returns 0 on success, 1 on error.
FILES
/etc/sysconfig/rhn/up2date
Configuration settings for Update Agent.
/etc/sysconfig/rhn/systemid
Unique system identification certificate for Red Hat Network.
/etc/sysconfig/rhn/up2date-keyring.gpg
The default keyring used specificaly for up2date, if used with
versions of rpm that support it (rpm-4.0.4 or higher)
/var/spool/up2date
The spool directory where rpm stores package lists, package headers
and packages.
/var/log/up2date
This is the log file for up2date.
/usr/share/rhn/RHNS-CA-CERT
The ssl certificate authority file used by up2date to
validate the Red Hat Network ssl servers.
/usr/share/rhn/RPM-GPG-KEY
A copy of the Red Hat, Inc rpm package signing
key. This is the gpg key that can be used to verify
a package is signed by Red Hat, Inc.
EXAMPLES
The following example starts up the interactive gui client.
up2date
The following example shows up2date being used in non-interactive
batch mode.
up2date -u
This example shows up2date being used to discover which
packages solve a set of deps manually on a Red Hat Linux
7.0 machine.
This example shows how to start up the text based config
tool.
up2date --nox --configure
This example shows how to use up2date to install
a package with many deps that isnt currently installed.
up2date kdebase
SEE ALSO
Configuration is performed through up2date-config. The Update
Agent is tightly coupled with Red Hat Network. Visit
<http://rhn.redhat.com> for access or to sign up. You can also
run rhn_register to register a system with Red Hat Network.
