Description of problem: when yum picks up packages as dependencies it'll only install the x86_64 version. if i specify the dependencies explicitly on the command line then it picks up both i386 and x86_64. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): yum-3.2.8-2.fc8 How reproducible: always afaik. Steps to Reproduce: 1. yum remove mono-core (it removes tomboy and a few others) 2. try yum install tomboy (it says it's going to put all the x86_64 packages back. cancel that.) 3. try yum install tomboy mono-core (it installs both versions of mono-core) Actual results: as above Expected results: step 2 (by dependency) and step 3 (explicit) should do the same thing. Additional info: this problem was highlighted by attempting a yum upgrade from f7 to f8. on the yumupgradefaq it's handled to a certain extent by recommending a "yum groupinstall sound-and-video gnome-desktop". a workaround for the entire system is: yum install `rpm -qa --qf "%{n}-%{v}-%{r} "` once the system's in this state running the above tends to produce lots of file conflicts so you have to remove stuff and reinstall explicitly specifying each dependency. :-)
Half of this bug in rpm and requires without arches and laying down multilib files in different transactions and half of it is yum. in yum 3.2.10 and above(which you can get from rawhide) you can set multilib_policy=best in your yum.conf and then yum install commands will only operate on the single arch for your system, not on the compat arch, too. With regard to updates that's a component we have to fix in the packaging and/or in rpm.