updating with yum (was: Need help: X GUI objects invisible)

[Bruce Elliott]

Jonathan Berry wrote:

>On Fri, 11 Feb 2005 08:36:26 -0500, Bruce Elliott
><belliott4488 at comcast.net> wrote:
>  
>
>>I'll try to track down the latest X11 and verify that it has the
>>necessary fix.  But, regarding SuSE - installing would be a pain,
>>especially if it required clobbering and then reinstalling Fedora, but
>>doesn't the fact that my SuSE installation had worked correctly on this
>>machine indicate that it included the required version of X11?  Is there
>>any way I might be able to get just that from the SuSE CDs?  Maybe it's
>>more trouble than it's worth ...
>>    
>>
>A simple "yum update" will go out to the internet and grab the
>necessary packages.  It will also update your entire system, which is
>highly recommended as a lot has gone on since FC3 was first released. 
>It will take a while to download and install all the packages,
>especially if you have a slow internet connection.  This also assumes
>you have installed the gpg keys that you need.  Something like
>rpm --import /usr/share/rhn/RPM-GPG-KEY*
>should do the trick, I believe.  This is probably the easiest way to
>get the updated packages.  
>
That sounds like a good idea. I've been using apt on my Red Hat machine, 
so I'm used to that. Does yum work along the same lines? I had to set up 
apt the first time so that it pointed to the right URLs for rpm 
repositories and so forth. Is there a similar process for yum?

Can you point me to a how-to page or a FAQ on using yum?

>If you just want to update X11, you might
>try "yum update x11" and see if that works to get X working.  You'll
>need to do a full update at some time, though.  This just might get X
>working so things are a little more convenient.
>  
>
I'll probably try to do a complete update, since this is a fresh 
install, and I don't really have anything to lose, except a little time. 
If I do run into trouble, then maybe I'll try just updating X, 
especially if there's a good GUI front-end for yum that makes life 
easier (?). apt has Synaptic, but I never really use it.

>To answer your questions about getting the packages from SuSE, in
>general, SuSE rpms will not install and work right on other distros
>(sometimes not even other versions of SuSE).  There may be exceptions
>to this, but they would be rare, and anything as complex as X11
>probably would not be an exception.  Besides, the SuSE package is most
>likely older as Fedora tends to stay on the cutting edge.
>
>Jonathan
>  
>
Okay, I was ready to ditch the SuSE idea, anyway.

BTW, I would have thought as you did, that SuSE would be less up-to-date 
than Fedora, but after all, X did work with this video card, which is 
why I'm assuming that this release (SuSE Linux Enterprise Server 8) has 
the more up-to-date version of X, at least.

thanks for the help,
Bruce