Novell LINUX ENTERPRISE SERVER 11 - ADMINISTRATION Administration Manual page 37

To remove an installed package, use:
zypper remove package_name
To install and remove packages simultaneously use the +/- or ~/! modifiers:
zypper install emacs -vim
Or:
zypper remove emacs +vim
Or, if you choose to use - with the first package you specify, you must write -- before
it to prevent its interpretation as a command option:
zypper install -- -vim emacs
WARNING: Do not Remove Mandatory System Packages
Do not remove packages such as glibc, zypper, kernel, or similar packages.
These packages are mandatory for the system and if removed the system may
stop working.
By default, Zypper asks for a confirmation before installing or removing a selected
package or when a problem occurs. You can override this behavior using the
--non-interactive option. This option must be given before the actual command
(install, remove, and patch) as in the following:
zypper --non-interactive install package_name
This option allows the use of Zypper in scripts and cron jobs.
If you want to install the corresponding source package of a package, use:
zypper source-install package_name
The following command will also install the build dependencies of the specified package.
If you do not want this, add the switch --no-build-deps as follows:
zypper source-install --no-build-deps package_name
Of course, this will only work if you have the repository with the source packages added
to your repository list. Enter zypper search -t srcpackage to get a list of
source packages available in your repositories. For more information about adding
repositories, see Section 4.1.4, "Managing Repositories" (page 24).
Managing Software with Command Line Tools 23