RPM

RPM stands for Red Hat Package Manager. However, these days RPM isn't only Red Hat specific because many other Linux distros use RPM for managing their software.With RPM, you can install, upgrade and uninstall software on Linux, as well as keep track of already installed RPM packages on your system. This can be done because RPM keeps a database of all software that was installed with it.

RPM uses software packages that have (surprise) the .rpm extension. An RPM package contains the actual software that gets installed, maybe some additional files for the software, information on where the software and its files get installed, and a list of other files you need to have on your system in order to run this specific piece of software.

When you use RPM for installing the software package, RPM checks if your system is suitable for the software the RPM package contains, figures out where to install the files the package provides, installs them on your system, and adds that piece of software into its database of installed RPM packages.

Note that you need to be root when installing software in Linux. When you've got the root privileges, you use the rpm command with appropriate options to manage your RPM software packages.

  • Install a package

# rpm –ivh packagename.rpm

  • upgrade a package

# rpm –Uvh packagename.rpm

  • if u dont want to install dependencies

# rpm -ivh --nodeps packagename.rpm

  • remove a package that was installed with RPM

# rpm -e packagename

  • to query a package :

# rpm -q package

  • list of all packages installed on your system

# rpm -qa

Executable programs go usually into /bin, /usr/bin, /usr/X11/bin, or /usr/X11R6/bin after installing with rpm.Sometimes the program gets automatically added into your menu, but usually you can just run the program by typing its name at the command prompt. In most cases you don't have to know where the program was installed because you don't have to type the whole path when running the program, only the program's name is needed.

convert .rpm to .deb

sudo alien -k package.rpm