help with RPM file

[dman1977]

want to install mplayer and lame. Was wondering what exactly is a RPM file and how does it work? I opened the lame RPM and it seems to go through a install process......does it automatically install software? Thanks for any help.

[deathadder]

Hi,


The RPM Package Manager (RPM) is a powerful command line driven package management system capable of installing, uninstalling, verifying, querying, and updating computer software packages. Each software package consists of an archive of files along with information about the package like its version, a description, and the like.

See http://www.rpm.org/ for more detailed information.

[Icarus]

Pretty much an RPM is like an Install Sheild for Linux. I prefer to install them from the command line so if they do bomb out for some reason I can quickly see the error and fix it. They usually bomb out because of incomplete dependencies, which are fairly easy to fix, just download all the ones it's asking for (rpmfind (http://rpmfind.net/) is great place to get what you need or if they are simple to find get them from the distro's repository) and put them all in the same directory and "rpm -ivh *" and you are either off and running or on a new hunt for RPM dependecnies :D

Most distros these days have a package management system that will (should) handle the install and dependancies for you