Installing Software URPMI part 2

INSTALLING SOFTWARE
URPMI ( part 2 )

In the first part of this Tip ( See Here ) I did show you how easy it is to install packages using urpmi. Now imagine you want to install a system monitor to watch CPU usage, net connection activity and memory use . . but you don't know what package to install.

What I usually do when I do not know the name of a package is go to www.google.com/linux and/or www.freshmeat.net and search for "system monitor" . . . it will for example suggest "gkrellm".

To see if the gkrellm package is available in Mandriva I open a terminal and do:

CODE

# urpmq --fuzzy gkrellm

and it will find these packages on the mandriva urpm repositories:

QUOTE

gkrellm
gkrellm-devel
gkrellm-plugins
gkrellm-plugins-kam
gkrellm-plugins-mms
gkrellm-plugins-shoot
gkrellm-plugins-snmp
gkrellm-plugins-stock
gkrellm-plugins-wmhdplop
gkrellm-server
gkrellm-themes

Next if I want to know more about the Mandriva gkrellm package I can do:

CODE

# urpmq -i gkrellm

and will see this:

QUOTE

Name : gkrellm
Version : 2.3.1
Release : 1mdv2009.0
Group : Monitoring
Size : 2320888
Architecture: i586
Source RPM : gkrellm-2.3.1-1mdv2009.0.src.rpm
URL : http://gkrellm.net
Summary : Multiple stacked system monitors

Description : GKrellM charts SMP CPU, load, Disk, and all active net interfaces automatically. An on/off button and online timer for the PPP interface is provided. Monitors for memory and swap usage, file system, internet connections, APM laptop battery, mbox style mailboxes, and cpu temps. Also includes an uptime monitor, a hostname label, and a clock/calendar.

Additional features are:
* Autoscaling grid lines with configurable grid line resolution.
* LED indicators for the net interfaces.
* A gui popup for configuration of chart sizes and resolutions.

Right, that was exactly what I was looking for, so now I can install it:

CODE

# urpmi gkrellm

For more special urpm tricks please read: urpmq and urpmf

Bruno

-- Dec 10 2008 --