Re: apt -> smart migration howto?

On Tue, 2005-11-22 at 09:49 +0000, Neil Bird wrote:
>    I believe I've set smartpm on my box now OK (although I'm not sure I've got 
> the definitions of the channels right;  I copied ATrpms, and they work but I 
> can't see what each 'type' of channel actually represents ('yum like', or 'apt 
> like', etc.).

I believe the preferable  metadata format for smart is the RPM-MD (the
one that yum 2.2 and greater uses I believe).
atrpms, dag, freshrpms, and dries provide all three meta data formats
(apt, old yum, and rpm-md)  So you basically just point smart to use
rpm-md and the location of where a current YUM would goto (which
$basearch and $releasever actually changed to what they are)


>    So the next step is, start trying to use it in anger.  I've got some of the 
> basics, but there are some things I can't figure out.  Is there a simple howto 
> anywhere?  The smartpm site seems a bit lacking in this area (unless I'm 
> missing it).

smart does most everything that apt can do.. and it does priority
management better IMHO.  The way it does thing is slightly different.
and it is a *developing* project. so any new features can be put into
their bug tracking system.

>    E.g., equiv. of 'apt-cache policy xxx', show available updates (I usually 
> just get 'updates available', but I'm not sure that means what it looks like).

hmm.. I usually only use apt-cache policy to see what versions are
available of a package. not to see pending updates. But you can do that
with

smart query packagename --show-channels

and it will list out put that contains which "channel" has updates
example:
# smart query rpm --show-channels
Loading cache...
Updating cache...
######################################################### [100%]

rpm-4.4.1-21@i386 [os]
rpm-4.4.1-22@i386 [rpm-db, updates]
rpm-4.4.1-22_49.rhfc4.at@i386 [atrpms]

if you want to show priority add --show-priority

I can't seem to find a way to get a list of "possible" upgrade other
than doing "smart upgrade" and choosing "no" if I don't want to update
them.  Sounds like a new feature request to me.

Usually I just use the GUI for getting a list of available updates 
"smart --gui"
 and then choose "hide non-upgrades" from the "view" menu

> 
>    I currently use apt, as I've never gotten on with yum, but I do have grief 
> with kernel/kmdl versions which smart seems to be a lot better with.
> 
-- 
Edward Rudd <[email protected]>