CentOS

harry edwards · 01-21-2008, 04:23 PM

I have a server running CentOS 4.5. It was installed using the minimal software option. After the installation I removed some extra packages i.e. Power Management.

The current list of start-up process is:

Code:

haldaemon       0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
netfs           0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
messagebus      0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
microcode_ctl   0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
kudzu           0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
sendmail        0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
syslog          0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
crond           0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
xinetd          0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
atd             0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
ntpd            0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:off   5:on    6:off
irqbalance      0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
iptables        0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
autofs          0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
network         0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
rawdevices      0:off   1:off   2:off   3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
openibd         0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
anacron         0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
lvm2-monitor    0:off   1:on    2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
sshd            0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
smartd          0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:on    6:off
cups            0:off   1:off   2:on    3:on    4:on    5:off   6:off

The server works fine; therefore, I do not have a problem as such.

I would like to strip my installation even more by removing CUPS. I am following the rule, if it's not installed it can't cause a security hole or slow my system. Trying to remove CUPS resulted in the following:

Code:

[~]#  rpm -e cups

error: Failed dependencies:
        /usr/bin/lp is needed by (installed) redhat-lsb-3.0-8.EL.i386
        /usr/bin/lpr is needed by (installed) redhat-lsb-3.0-8.EL.i386

Right, with a bit of searching I found the lsb is the Linux Standard Base project. Therefore it sounds reasonable to keep CUPS; but, why leave CUPS installed when I never intend to print.

Can anyone advise? (Am I mad)

Lenard · 01-21-2008, 05:04 PM

leave it installed but disable the service;
service cups stop
chkconfig --levels 2345 cups off
(so it will not restart in the future)

You can do the same chkconfig option with other services like kudzu also.

Brian1 · 01-21-2008, 05:11 PM

Not sure if it is actually needed but so many rpms have requirements that aren't really needed. For now I would do as mentioned. Turn the service off. Doesn't really take up much space.

Brian

harry edwards · 01-22-2008, 03:21 AM

Thanks I'll stop the service as suggested.

unSpawn · 01-22-2008, 05:33 AM

If nothing else needs printing then it's perfectly possible to keep redhat-lsb (using 'lsb_release --all' doesn't need printing) and ditch CUPS w/o any problems. Just add the "--nodeps" switch when using "-e". Adding "tsflags" in yum.conf and using "--repackage" switch with "rpm -e" will dump the uninstalled package in /var/spool/repackage so you can have rollback, just in case.