Building Tablet PC Applications (Pro-Developer)
A Special Agent: up2date
One alternative to Rawhide is the Red Hat Update Agent, also known by its text command, up2date . This section assumes you ve registered for the Red Hat Network as discussed in Chapter 03 . When you registered, you sent a list of installed RPM packages on your system. With the Red Hat Update Agent, you can check the Red Hat database for newer RPM packages, and have them installed as desired.
You can start the Red Hat Update Agent by running the up2date command at the command-line interface. Figure 10.3 assumes that you ve already registered your computer on the Red Hat Network and started up2date in a GUI.
Otherwise, you may see the Red Hat Network Configuration window, and windows to log into the Red Hat Network and transmit basic information and a list of packages installed on your computer. For details, see Chapter 03 .
Assuming you ve already registered, you should now see the Channels dialog box, as shown in Figure 10.4. As you can see, this dialog box lists the channel for Red Hat Linux 9. Click Forward to continue.
| Note | If you have an active Red Hat Demo account, you re limited to one computer on that account. You ll need to delete the current computer on that account before you can register the new computer. |
Next , up2date reviews the available RPM packages on the Red Hat network and compares them to what you have installed. Assuming you ve designated RPM packages to be skipped during the registration process, and there are updates of those packages available, you should see something similar to Figure 10.5 (kernel version 2.4.21 was not available as of this writing). This gives you a chance to install these packages. Make any desired choices, and then click Forward to continue.
The next step allows you to review available updates ”in other words, newer RPM packages that you might install. Figure 10.6 configures the update of the Mozilla web browser (your choices will probably not be identical). Make your selections, and then click Forward to continue.
As described earlier, there can be RPM dependencies. If other packages need to be installed, up2date lists them for you.
Assuming you wish to proceed, click Forward to continue. The Red Hat Update Agent will begin downloading the desired and dependent RPM packages, similar to what is shown in Figure 10.7.
Now that the packages are on your Linux computer, up2date will begin installing them. Your system should look similar to Figure 10.8. Once installation is complete, you ll see a dialog box that lists the RPM packages that up2date installed on your computer.