Bug 1457

Summary:	redundant package entries with rpm
Product:	[Retired] Red Hat Raw Hide	Reporter:	bperkins
Component:	rpm	Assignee:	Jeff Johnson <jbj>
Status:	CLOSED WORKSFORME	QA Contact:
Severity:	medium	Docs Contact:
Priority:	medium
Version:	1.0
Target Milestone:	---
Target Release:	---
Hardware:	i386
OS:	Linux
Whiteboard:
Fixed In Version:		Doc Type:	Bug Fix
Doc Text:		Story Points:	---
Clone Of:		Environment:
Last Closed:	1999-03-22 20:57:50 UTC	Type:	---
Regression:	---	Mount Type:	---
Documentation:	---	CRM:
Verified Versions:		Category:	---
oVirt Team:	---	RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team:	---	Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description bperkins 1999-03-09 19:33:05 UTC

Had a friend that accidentally upgraded to this version of
rpm (rpm-2.91-17.i386.rpm) on a 5.x system and had lots of
problems.

if one does rpm -i --force package.rpm
on a package that already exist,s it reinstalls the
package,  as it ought to, but makes another entry in the rpm
database.  This is a royal pain to fix, since you can't
remove it normally ( you need to use --allmatches) and then
resinstall the packages.

Not sure if it's relevant or fixed already, just thought I'd
mention it.

Comment 1 Joseph Malicki 1999-03-09 20:20:59 UTC

This won't happen if you use -U --force instead of -i --force.

Comment 2 bperkins 1999-03-09 20:56:59 UTC

Fine, but this behavior differs from rpm-2.5.3-5.1, and the behavior,
though not completely irrational isn't rational either.  Also, I
suspect -U will remove packages of lower versions, which may not be
desireable.

Comment 3 Jeff Johnson 1999-03-10 00:54:59 UTC

Ah, you need to do
	rpm --rebuilddb
when switching from rpm-2.5.x to rpm-2.9x. In rpm-2.9x filenames
are stored relatively, while in rpm-2.5.x filenames are absolute.

At least I think that's what the problem is. Please reopen this bug
if I'm wrong.

Comment 4 bperkins 1999-03-10 02:00:59 UTC

the --rebuilddb was run several times, in order to try to fix the
problem.  Let me reiterate that rpm -i --force package.rpm does "the
right thing" in not producing duplicate entries, while 2.91-17
produced duplicate database entires.  The duplicate entries were
impossible to remove without ripping out the rpms and putting them
back in again.  I can't imagine why this is desireable behavior.

  The reason we were doing this in the first place was to install rpms
that were of the same version but a "different build"
Anyway, we "fixed" the problem by downgrading rpm, I just thought
you'd like to know we found this bug, and it probably needs to be
fixed eventually (though not for my benefit). If you still think it's
not a bug then go ahead and close it.

Comment 5 bperkins 1999-03-10 02:03:59 UTC

ah shoot.

> Let me reiterate that rpm -i --force package.rpm does the "right
> thing"

should read

> Let me reiterate that rpm -i --force package.rpm under rpm-2.5.3-5.1
> does the "right thing"

Comment 6 Jeff Johnson 1999-03-22 20:57:59 UTC

I cannot reproduce this problem with rpm-2.93-2. I think
the original problem was caused by either
	neglecting to run rpm --rebuilddb when upgrading to rpm-2.9x
or
	bugs in rpm-2.91
Thanks for the report.