Noticed that up2date has an upraded version of evolution and evolution-data-server for me. Since I've switched to Thunderbird, I don't want 'em. Decided to remove them from the system. Getting rid of evolution was uneventful, but rpm -e evolution-data-server returns ... libebook.so.8 is needed by (installed) gaim-1.1.4-1.FC3.i386.

# 'locate' tells me that libebook.so.8 is located in /usr/lib/. That's a good place for it. Is there a way to get rpm -e to go ahead and remove evolution-data-server leaving libebook.so.8 alone so that Gaim can still use it?

Also ... when I (shortly) start using yum instead of rpm, will I still be able to use rpm to remove programs, or will I have to use whichever one I used to install it?

It is likely that removing the data-server package will remove the libebook package. It automated and you will lose it. What you could do is go to the RPMFind site and download just that library, remove the Evolution package and reinstall the libebook rpm by hand.

And you can use manual rpms and YUM at the same time.

Yum accesses the same single RPM database below /var/lib/rpm, so you can switch freely between yum, rpm and up2date. No problems. Just make sure, yum and up2date access the same remote repositories. That means, they fetch packages from the same sources.

<Just make sure, yum and up2date access the same remote repositories.>

Thanks. Don't think I want to hassle with coordinating yum and up2date. Even if I did, I might well have things I installed with rpm when it was getting things from a different repo. I'll start using yum sometime when I do a fresh Fedora install.

I'm more disappointed that I can't ignore shared files when I'm deleting an unwanted program. Even Windows lets me do that.

No, it doesn't. You want to delete a library, which is needed by an installed program. That's only possible if you break package dependencies by deleting the file manually or removing the package, ignoring dependencies. Be prepared to deal with a broken application then.

<< Even Windows lets me do that.>>
<No, it doesn't.>

I have often deleted programs from Windows and gotten a message that some related files may be shared by other programs; do I want to delete those as well? Of course, the answer to that is, 'No.' It doesn't even give me a clue what other programs may be affected. ... but it does delete the package, leaving the (possibly) shared files. Very clumsy and MS-like.

<You want to delete a library, which is needed by an installed program. That's only possible if you break package dependencies by deleting the file manually or removing the package, ignoring dependencies.>

Without understanding the internal intricacies of rpm -e; from external appearances, there is a simple step missing from rpm by which the problem could be handled nicely. Rather than simply collapsing at the discovery of a conficting dependency, perhaps rpm -e could say, 'usr/lib/libebook.so.8 is needed by (installed) gaim-1.1.4-1.FC3.i386, Delete anyway? (Y/N)'

Is that desirable? I doubt that. Installation of the shared file already permitted to overwrite existing files and replace them with a different, probably messed up or incompatible version.

With RPM you would achieve the same by installing and upgrading packages with --replacefiles (an option implicitly included in the --force option). That would allow packages to overwrite already installed files, e.g. libraries shared with other packages, and then a file would belong to multiple packages.

But to ask for deletion of a shared file and leave broken packages in place, is an irrationale request.

No. If you really want to delete a shared and hence required package, you are free to do that with e.g. "rpm --erase --nodeps packagename". This is an option for the experienced administrator, not something Joe User should be able to do with a click of the mouse button and answering "Yes" to a question.

RPM and package tools like Yum just prefer sane defaults.

here comed the rpm -e --force which is highly not recommended in general

On this subject...I have a FC4 box and when I try to install Gnomemeeting form source I get an error about libebook no being intaled. I checked and it isn't in usr/lib. I tried RPMFind but couldn't find it. Where do i get libebook from?
Thanks

gnomemeeting is included with FC4.

But you can run yum install evolution-data-server-devel to install the package which contains the development pieces for libebook.

Also compare with: yum whatprovides /usr/lib/libebook-1.2.so

Don't know if that work, but if I search for RPMs, then only on rpm.pbone.net!