Are there any reasons why I should remove a repository when I am done using it? Will this cause any compatibility issues in the future? Or, can I keep all of the additional repos installed?

Thanks.

What distro are you using?

You almost always want to leave the repository there so that you can get updates.

I'm on CentOS 6.5.

I once had someone tell me that I should disable or remove repositories when I am done using them, because it could slow yum down significantly and cause dependency issues. I'm new to Linux, have been searching online to see if I can recover any other information regarding this and have not found much, if anything. Thanks for your response, maples, was wondering if anyone had issues leaving repos in place or if I should be good to go. This person was talking about a server environment if it would make any difference.

The slowing down is simply a matter of the data having to be updated for all active repositories when you run yum, gpk, or apper: unless you have a very slow internet connection, it's hardly going to be a problem. After all, you don't install new software very often, but you do want to keep up-to-date, as maples said.

The matter is dependencies is very important, however. It's explained here
http://wiki.centos.org/AdditionalResources/Repositories
The best way to avoid nasty accidents is to set priorities
http://wiki.centos.org/PackageManagement/Yum/Priorities
I use priority=1 for CentOS, 2 for EPEL, 3 for RPMfusion.

Then you're already one release behind.


Couple of things:
First of all disabling repos means not being notified of updates. That's a Bad Thing.
Next indeed priorities as DavidMcCann suggested but that will only help on install / update, not querying repos.
Next using the "yum-plugin-fastestmirror" plugin which speaks for itself. (And maybe "yum-plugin-rpm-warm-cache".)
Next, depending on what you query for, consecutive queries may use cached nfo so use "-C" as in 'yum info firefox; yum -C info armadillo;'.
Another thing is lean querying as in 'yum --disablerepo=\* --enablerepo=rsyslogd whatprovides */rsyslogd;'.

As far as dependency issues are concerned indeed straying from the recommendations listed in the AdditionalResources Wiki page leads to fear. Fear leads to anger etc, etc.


No it doesn't. Well there are exceptions like repos you get one and only one thing from and knowing that package won't be updated in ages. However that would be a good reason to question utilizing such repos in the first place.