Urpmi on crack
 

Urpmi is great! Much better than trying to install rpms using rpm. (It is similar to apt-get, apparently.)

But, once in a while, it has an attack of the crackmonkeys, which I'm trying to figure out.

Here's a few cases:

A) For example, I set it loose installing spamassassin, and it downloaded over 250MBs of software (including fresh versions of Gimp & Evolution.) My question is, WTF?

Did it decide to replace library Y.X with library Y.Y, and thus break the old gimp's dependencies, and thus decide to download a new version of gimp?

And when it does decide to do this, how good is it at tidying up old versions of software?

B) Sometimes it will decide that it wants to remove a bunch of software (and I mean, a bunch.) I've always cancelled when it asks to do this because I'm a chickenshit -- would it have reinstalled new versions??

C) Sometimes even after downloading 250MBs of dependencies (e.g. in the case of SpamAssassin) it breaks because of some other dependency that it didn't catch, even when I apparently have the right version of the software. Has anyone else noticed this?

So, has anybody used apt on Mandrake? I tried Yum but it attempted to get RedHat 7.3 repositories, which worried me a little. How good or bad is the apt port for rpms?

Thanks

stay with urpmi.
I notice you are running 9.0 and not 9.1. Are your rpm repositories ones for 9.0 as well? If they are for 9.1 you'd see the kind of massive dependencies that you're seeing because of some major differences between the versions. It can also happen when you are trying to install things from cooker.

I'm probably trying to be a smartass with it. I have quite a few different repositories, some official 9 ones, some I know to be 9.1 ones, some are not specifically either.

How difficult would it be to update to "9.1 compatibility" just using urpmi? I don't like the MS style subscription model of OS where you have to periodically buy the latest -- which was my thinking in adding the 9.1 repositories. Where would I start?

I'm still curious about how good it is in tidying up versions it replaces, and about whether it will replace software it wants to remove. Any clues?

you don't have to buy anything from mandrake. You can download 9.1 for free and also the upcoming 9.2. The thing to do for you to get up to 9.1 compatibility is to actually install it though since 9.2 is coming out soon, I would wait and install 9.2 when it's available.

When it uninstalls A B and C because it needs to uninstall D to install newer version of D, chances are it won't replace A,B,C with their newer versions.

I realize that downloading is possible, and have done similar with various distros in the past. I just don't like the brute force effect of it, since it means having to reinstall all the goodies that I've accumulated, if I'm wiping out the old system. It would be much nicer if I could upgrade from within, kinda deal. Well, I shall experiment in more depth and post results if I get any.
Thanks

the mandrake installer does come with an upgrade option which does not wipe everything. A lot of people, including myself, have had disasterous experiences with that option though...but you might give it a try.