The zypper utility has a very feature-rich
search utility built in that allows you to quickly
and
efficiently search through all, or certain, repositories for packages. Having the search
utility right at your fingertips adds to making software maintenance very easy. Table 2-6
shows some of the most useful search commands for zypper.
Table 2-6: Useful zypper Search Commands|
Command Abbreviation Description
|
|
search se Use with a search pattern to narrow the search query or without
to see all available packages. Use –t to
specify a resolvable to limit searching to.
|
|
patches pch Search for and display all known patches.
|
|
patch-info Include the patch name in the command to display full information about that patch.
|
Table 2-6: Useful zypper Search Commands
(continued)|
Command
|
Abbreviation
|
Description
|
|
info
|
if
|
Include the package name
to show full information about that package.
|
|
list-updates
|
lu
|
List all available updates.
|
The following example shows
how to add a repository and search for packages and patches using the zypper command. In this example,
we’ll tackle software drivers for wireless networking cards, because you often require
extra repositories to find drivers for wireless cards, and because the drivers get patched frequently. If your system sports
a wireless card, you’ll often want to install driver packages for your card, or download
patches to update those drivers.
The Madwifi (http://madwifi.org/) project provides a SUSE repository of packages
for
the popular Atheros chipset, a chipset used in wireless networking
cards from many
vendors. For installing wireless networking kernel drivers, having a repository custom
tailored for your SUSE system can be very handy.
Start by adding the Madwifi install location using the zypper command in the same way as the previous example. Make sure you are adding the correct install location for
the
version of openSUSE you are running. Because we are using openSUSE 10.3 for this chapter, we’ll add the 10.3 install location (change this for your version if neces- sary) and name the repository madwifi.
#
zypper ar http://madwifi.org/suse/10.3/ madwifi
You can now use the zypper command to perform a case-insensitive search of anything you want. You can see in the results that the search returned case-insensitive results for the original term.
#
zypper se wIFi
*
Reading installed packages
[100%]
S
| Repository | Type | Name | Version | Arch
--+-----------------+---------+-----------------+-------------------+-----
...
| testcdrom | package | iwlwifi-kmp-x...|
0.1.16_2.6.22....
| i586
| madwifi | package | madwifi | 0.9.3.2-1 | i586
...
If you search for something more generic, you’ll see that zypper searches across
all enabled repositories, and reports back with the packages and repositories where the search query
was found:
#
zypper se util
*
Reading installed packages
[100%]
S
| Repository | Type | Name | Version | Arch
--+-----------------+---------+-----------------+-----------------+-------
v
| openSUSE-10.3...| package | alsa-utils | 1.0.14-25 | i586
i | http://downlo...| package | alsa-utils | 1.0.14-27 | i586 v | testcdrom | package | alsa-utils | 1.0.14-25 | i586
| openSUSE-10.3...| package | apache2-utils...|
2.2.4-66 | i586
...
In the first column of the output is the package Status. A v or i in this column
indicates that another version of the package is installed, or the package, as
listed, is already installed. The second column shows in which Zypper repository the search word was found. The Type describes the type of resolvable the line refers to. Name
and Version are obvious, and Arch lists whether this package is compiled for a specific system architecture.
Zypper uses something
called resolvables to
designate the different types of resources you want it to work with. A resolvable can be a package, patch, pattern, language,
or product. You can select the different types of resolvables using the –t flag along with the resolvable you want to act on:
#
zypper se -t patch
S | Repository | Type | Name | Version | Arch
--+-----------------+-------+-----------------+-----------+-------
| openSUSE-10.3...| patch | fetchmsttfont...| 4347-0 | noarch i | | patch
| update-test-a...|
2609-0 | noarch
To limit
the patch search to a specific piece of software, you could add a search
pattern to the
zypper command:
#
zypper se -t patch msttfont
*
Reading installed packages
[100%]
S | Repository | Type | Name | Version | Arch
--+-------------------------+-------+-------------------+---------+-------
| openSUSE-10.3-Updates...| patch | fetchmsttfonts.sh | 4347-0 | noarch
To search the language resolvables, use the –t language command to show
just language resolvables
instead of packages. To look for the
Estonian language packs, for example, you would use a zypper command such as:
#
zypper se -t language et
*
Reading installed packages
[100%]
S | Repository | Type | Name | Version | Arch
--+------------+----------+------+-----------+------- i | | language | et | |
noarch
You can also use the zypper command to list available software patches by way of the
pch command:
#
zypper
pch
*
Reading repository ‘openSUSE-10.3-DVD
10.3’ cache
*
Reading repository
‘madwifi’ cache
*
Reading repository
‘ftp.gwdg.de’
cache
*
Reading repository
‘Main Repository (NON-OSS)’ cache
*
Reading repository ‘openSUSE-10.3-Updates’ cache
*
Reading repository
‘testcdrom’
cache
*
Reading repository
‘Main Repository (OSS)’ cache
*
Reading installed packages
[100%]
Repository: | Name | Version | Category | Status
---------------+-------------------+---------+----------+----------- openSUSE-10....| fetchmsttfonts.sh
| 4347-0 | optional | Not Needed
To view more information about the fetchmsttfonts.sh patch, you can issue the patch-info command to zypper along with the field from the Name column. It must match the Name column exactly:
#
zypper patch-info fetchmsttfonts.sh
*
Reading repository ‘openSUSE-10.3-DVD
10.3’ cache
...
Name: fetchmsttfonts.sh
Version: 4347-0
Arch: noarch Status: Not Needed Category:
optional
Created On: Fri 21
Aug 1970
02:15:19 AM CDT
...
You can also view similar
information about a package (rather than a patch) by issuing the
info command with zypper:
#
zypper info alsa-utils
...
Information for package alsa-utils:
Repository: Main Repository (OSS) Name: alsa-utils
Version: 1.0.14-27
Arch: i586
Installed: Yes Status:
up-to-date Installed Size: 1.6 M
Summary: Advanced Linux Sound Architecture Utilities
Description:
<!-- DT:Rich -->
<p>This package contains
utility programs supporting ALSA, Advanced Linux
Sound
Architecture.
</p>
You can also use the zypper command to list all available updates it knows about:
#
zypper lu
*
Reading repository ‘openSUSE-10.3-DVD
10.3’ cache
*
Reading repository
‘madwifi’ cache
*
Reading repository
‘Guru’s RPM
site’ cache
*
Reading repository
‘Main Repository (NON-OSS)’ cache
*
Reading repository ‘openSUSE-10.3-Updates’ cache
*
Reading repository
‘testcdrom’
cache
*
Reading repository
‘Main Repository (OSS)’ cache
* Reading installed
packages [100%] No updates
found.
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