On Thu, 20 Jan 2005 17:06:52 -0200, Andreas Hasenack <andreas@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> > They are less in size than what yum downloads, because the pkglist file > used by apt doesn't have to list all files inside packages. You are talking about apt for rpm here or are you basing this on experience of using apt with debian packages? My understanding is .deb packages don't have a native understanding of 'file dependancies' where as .rpm packages do. My understanding is dated to mid 2003 which was the last time i read up on the differences between the .deb and .rpm packaging formats... so I might have an out of date understanding, Once you have explicit file dependancies like "Requires /sbin/ldconfig" in packages you have to make some effort to grab the file lists to be able to resolve that sort of requirement. How else do you resolve file dependancies, if you don't have the per-package file lists? And I'm pretty sure the metadata structures yum is using now 2.1.x don't download all the filelists unless an exotic file dependancy has to be met. I'm pretty sure that commonly used filelist information (things like (/usr)/(s)bin/* , /etc/* and /var/lib/*) is stored in the primary.xml metadata file.. while the full file lists (things like /usr/share/docs/*) are kept in filelists.xml. -jef
