Generally, the only time I would use a tarball and compile myself would be:
1)If no rpm was available
2)If a feature was missing in the rpm version that I needed to enable, (
a classic example here would be milter support in sendmail, but I think
thats in the rpms these days).
You can reduce still further the chances of no rpms being available by
adding the DAG repository to your yum.conf file. This adds a lot of
stuff that would otherwise take a bit of finding....
Becareful though, you should be aware of the possible consequences and
pitfalls of updating from multiple repositories....generally I use dag
to get stuff that isn't available from the standard yum repos... but not
for an os update...
P.
Ignacio Vazquez-Abrams wrote:
>On Mon, 2006-01-09 at 00:18 -0800, Mickael Maddison wrote:
>
>
>>Hello CentOS,
>>
>>I'm an old hat, and have been compiling my own MySQL, Apache, PHP,
>>OpenSSL, ModSSL, etc. for my webservers for years. I'm playing around
>>with the RPM installs on CentOS, and have basically been able to get
>>most things setup so that they "function" about the same.
>>
>>If I could stick to RPM's rather than compiling my own sources, it
>>would save me a fair bit of time, but of course, it would limit the
>>customization benefit. what I'm wondering, is if anyone on this list
>>has any good reasons why one method would be better, more secure, etc
>>than the other. I'm tempted to start using RPM's instead of compile
>>sources.
>>
>>Comments appreciated, thanks.
>>
>>
>
>Well, let's look at why tarballs might be better than packages:
>
>- Both are customizable before the build, but packages aren't afterward.
>
>No, wait, once a tarball has been compiled then that's it...
>
>- Tarballs are easier to manage since they all go in /usr/local.
>
>Well, no, they get spread throughout /usr/local. OTOH, packages are
>managed on a file-by-file basis in the rpmdb. This also makes it easier
>to discover if files have been modified or corrupted since installation.
>
>Okay, I'm out of reasons why tarballs are better. Maybe we should look
>at the flipside.
>
>- Package builds are reproducible.
>
>So are tarballs, if you're willing to type in or copy all the commands
>you used to install them identical to the letter, *plus* can make sure
>that you have exactly the same set of tarballs built or -devel packages
>installed before you run configure. Better to just let the spec file
>handle all that for you ("hey dumbass, you forgot to install
>openssl-devel!").
>
>- Package builds can run arbitrary commands.
>
>So can tarballs, but once again with the typing them in or running a
>script. With a spec file it's just *all there*.
>
>- Package builds are archivable.
>
>So are tarballs, at least until you misplace the sheet of paper you
>wrote the notes on. SRPMs can easily be transmitted via NFS, SMB,
>optical media, etc., as a single file, and are rebuildable by running
>"rpmbuild --rebuild" against them. Easy peasy.
>
>Well, those are my reasons for using packages over tarballs. I'm sure
>others have their reasons, but I can only speak for myself.
>
>
>
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