Note: "permalinks" may not be as permanent as we would like,
direct links of old sources may well be a few messages off.
Lars Ellenberg wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 29, 2010 at 11:17:19PM -0600, Alan Robertson wrote:
>> Hi,
>>
>> This is probably a FAQ, but I just installed a DRBD package, and it
>> installed a Xen kernel for/to me. This seems a bit unnecessary, and
>> arguably unfriendly...
>
> What did it do?
> Install a kernel?
> Certainly not.
>
>> What did I miss?
>>
>> Here's the RPM info:
>> $ rpm -q -i drbd
>> Name : drbd Relocations: (not relocatable)
>> Version : 8.3.6 Vendor: (none)
>
> You should be using 8.3.7.
> We had a package split, 8.3.5 is the last "monolithic" userland,
> 8.3.6 had minor packaging glitches, and 8.3.7 got the packaging "right".
>
> Previous drbd userland was monolithic,
> and to conform to fedora packaging guidelines
> we split this into several.
>
> To ease upgrading, the "drbd" package now is a virtual package,
> depending ("Requires:") on all parts formerly part of the monolithic
> package.
>
> One of those is named drbd-xen, and provides the Xen block device
> management script for DRBD.
> Again, according to packaging guidelines, this has to
> "Requires: xen" (at least on fedora).
>
> This is how it pulls in a lot of xen dependencies,
> probably also a kernel ;-)
>
> Which is why we relaxed these Requires for RHEL packages
> on the way to 8.3.7.
>
>> Release : 1.el5 Build Date: Tue 08 Dec
>> 2009 08:43:15 AM GMT
>> Install Date: Tue 30 Mar 2010 05:07:29 AM GMT Build Host: localhost
>> Group : System Environment/Kernel Source RPM:
>> drbd-8.3.6-1.el5.src.rpm
>> Size : 45901 License: GPLv2+
>> Signature : (none)
>> URL : http://www.drbd.org/
>> Summary : DRBD driver for Linux
>> Description :
>> DRBD mirrors a block device over the network to another machine.
>> Think of it as networked raid 1. It is a building block for
>> setting up high availability (HA) clusters.
>>
>> This is a virtual package, installing the full DRBD userland suite.
>
> Sic.
>
> Solution: install those packages you actually need,
> not "the full DRBD userland suite" (with strict dependencies
> according to packaging guidelines).
Thanks for the explanation. Good that you've relaxed your requirements
for future installs. It will also be good when enterprise kernels pick
up DRBD. I'm not sure I'll live that long though ;-).
--
Alan Robertson <alanr at unix.sh>
"Openness is the foundation and preservative of friendship... Let me
claim from you at all times your undisguised opinions." - William
Wilberforce