Packages data dependencies

adraganov · 04-12-2011, 05:37 PM

Hi everybody,

I am trying to install a piece of software that requires a specific versions of several packages. I am using Scientific Linux 5.5 and yum for managing the apps.
The problem is that I need, for example ruby >= 1.8.7, but the package for ruby that is the official repositories for SL 5.5 is 1.8.5 and therefore yum says it's up to date.
There are other repositories for SL 6.0 that have ruby-1.8.7. Initially I ignored the fact that they are not for 5.5 and tried to install it manually with rpm. But there was an increasing number of data dependencies for the packages so I gave up.
What can I do to avoid this? I suppose installing packages for newer OS version should be ok and they will be compatible with other older libs. But do you really install packages in this manner?
Any help will be highly appreciated!

Cheers

andrewthomas · 04-12-2011, 10:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by adraganov

Hi everybody,

I am trying to install a piece of software that requires a specific versions of several packages. I am using Scientific Linux 5.5 and yum for managing the apps.
The problem is that I need, for example ruby >= 1.8.7, but the package for ruby that is the official repositories for SL 5.5 is 1.8.5 and therefore yum says it's up to date.
There are other repositories for SL 6.0 that have ruby-1.8.7. Initially I ignored the fact that they are not for 5.5 and tried to install it manually with rpm. But there was an increasing number of data dependencies for the packages so I gave up.
What can I do to avoid this?

Your best bet is to upgrade to SL 6.0.

Quote:

Originally Posted by adraganov

I suppose installing packages for newer OS version should be ok and they will be compatible with other older libs. But do you really install packages in this manner?

No, they are built against newer libraries.
You either need to upgrade to 6 or you need to get the source packages for all the dependencies and build them on SL 5.5.