What are the .rpm things and how are they supposed to work?!
 

I've been trying to make them work, but I can't. The crazy thing is, my questions are beyond simple and nobody seems to have answered them anywhere in the (huge) manual that came with linux or on-line. If anyone can answer just one of these questions I'd be happy!

1. What is a .rmp file? Is it like a .exe installer for the program, or does it do something else entirely?

2. Where am I supposed to put the file. I thought it must be supposed to go in root, or somewhere else specific, or can I just run it from anywhere?

3. How do I run the file? In fact, am I even supposed to be trying to run the file like a program? I have tried double clicking on the file and nothing seems to happen. I've also attempted to open them through the command prompt and that didn't really work well (I think that's what broke my linux installation). Or is there a program I'm supposed to be using to run them?

Well, I could think of a hundred more questions, but I don't want to get too involved just yet. Besides, my copy of linux is broken right now, so I can't try anything until it's fixed. I just want to know more before I go anywhere near the confusing things again. Thanks to anyone who helps!

Re: What are the .rpm things and how are they supposed to work?!
 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Ben84

1. What is a .rmp file? Is it like a .exe installer for the program, or does it do something else entirely?
It stands for Redhat package management. It is the "install program" for any redhat-based distrobution. You could think of them as the Windows .exe file that you download to install a program.

2. Where am I supposed to put the file. I thought it must be supposed to go in root, or somewhere else specific, or can I just run it from anywhere?
It really doesn't matter where you download them. Back when I used redhat, I downloaded all RPMs to /tmp and installed them from there.

3. How do I run the file? In fact, am I even supposed to be trying to run the file like a program? Or is there a program I'm supposed to be using to run them?
Mandrake probably has tools to installed these for you, but I used the command line. type
rpm -i filename.rpm
should install the package. Many distrobutions have the rpmtools to install these packages, but each distrobution is slightly different and might put configuration files in different places causing an rpm to fail. Mandrake should do good most of the time.

If you have more questions post them in the relevant forum. Unfortunetly I have no life and hang around here too much.

Re: What are the .rpm things and how are they supposed to work?!
 

The complete explanation is located here at LinuxQuestions.org

I clicked on the Linux Wiki link off of the Main Menu, then typed "rpm" into the search box and clicked "saerch", which brought up this link > http://wiki.linuxquestions.org/wiki/Rpm

RPM used to stand for REdhat Package Manager, but that has changed to RPM Package Manager because RPMs are used on other distros that are not REdhat or Redhat derivatives. The link to the wiki has a lot more information and so does rpm.org.

That sounds really simple... Everywhere else I've been to made it sound like you had to re-program the entire computer just to make a clone pong game work!

Anyway, thank you for clearing up those confusions and hopefully it will all work fine when I do get a chance to try it out.