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Which patches are already installed in the system and for which package versions?
A list of all patches installed in the system can be displayed with the command
rpm -qPa. If only one patch is installed in a new system (as in this example), the
list appears as follows:
rpm -qPa
pine-4.44-224
If, at a later date, you want to know which package version was originally installed,
this information is also available in the RPM database. For pine, this information
can be displayed with the following command:
rpm -q --basedon pine
pine = 4.44-188
More information, including information about the patch feature of RPM, is available
in the man pages of rpm and rpmbuild.
15.4 Delta RPM Packages
Delta RPM packages contain the difference between an old and a new version of an
RPM package. Applying a delta RPM on an old RPM results in the complete new RPM.
It is not necessary to have a copy of the old RPM, because a delta RPM can also work
with an installed RPM. The delta RPM packages are even smaller in size than patch
RPMs, which is an advantage when transferring update packages over the Internet. The
drawback is that update operations with delta RPMs involved consume considerably
more CPU cycles than plain or patch RPMs.
The prepdeltarpm, writedeltarpm, and applydeltarpm binaries are part
of the delta RPM suite (package deltarpm) and help you create and apply delta RPM
packages. With the following commands, create a delta RPM called new.delta.rpm.
The following command assumes that old.rpm and new.rpm are present:
prepdeltarpm -s seq -i info old.rpm > old.cpio
prepdeltarpm -f new.rpm > new.cpio
xdelta delta -0 old.cpio new.cpio delta
writedeltarpm new.rpm delta info new.delta.rpm
Finally, remove the temporary working files old.cpio, new.cpio, and delta.
RPM—the Package Manager
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