It would be good if yum had an option to run, as long as no other packages would be installed (similar to apt's behaviour). For example, if mutt has no dependencies # yum install mutt would install mutt without asking me if it's okay. It is okay, because it's going to do exactly what I told it to do. If installing mutt would pull in another package, then a prompt is not exactly what I've asked, so it should prompt me.
from man yum.conf: alwaysprompt Either â1â or â0â. Without this option, yum will not prompt for confirmation when the list of packages to be installed exactly matches those given on the command line. Unless assumeyes is enabled, it will still prompt for package removal, or when addi- tional packages need to be installed to fulfill dependencies. Default is â1â.
Thanks for this. I'll use it. The other unix commands do what I tell them, even if it's a bad thing (e.g. mv /usr /tmp/usr). Can I ask why it isn't the default?
I've answered this question, in detail, on the yum-devel list. short version is this: computer programs should act predictably. Prompting 'sometimes' is not predictable. I really don't want to rehash it here.