[CentOS] yum-plugin-security

Sat Nov 22 11:49:19 UTC 2014
Gabriele Pohl <gp at dipohl.de>

Hi all,

I have difficulties to understand the output of yum-plugin-security.

I am on a X86_64 machine and when I query for security updates, 
yum lists i686 packages, that I don't have installed.

--------------------
# yum check-update --security
Loaded plugins: changelog, fastestmirror, security
Loading mirror speeds from cached hostfile
 * base: centos.mirror.linuxwerk.com
 * epel: mirrors.n-ix.net
 * extras: centos.mirror.sharkservers.co.uk
 * updates: centos.mirror.sharkservers.co.uk
Limiting package lists to security relevant ones
No packages needed for security; 34 packages available

cyrus-sasl-devel.i686                          2.1.23-15.el6_6.1                 updates
cyrus-sasl-lib.i686                            2.1.23-15.el6_6.1                 updates
device-mapper-multipath-libs.i686              0.4.9-80.el6_6.1                  updates
libXfont.i686                                  1.4.5-4.el6_6                     updates
nss-softokn.i686                               3.14.3-18.el6_6                   updates
nss-softokn-freebl.i686                        3.14.3-18.el6_6                   updates
perl-libs.i686                                 4:5.10.1-136.el6_6.1              updates
--------------------

I would have expected, that it will list no packages,
as it's statement is "No packages needed for security"

When I run the query with no filtering on security relevant packages,
it shows the X86_64 versions of the above listed packages.

Do we have a problem of inconsistent data in the repo?
Are only the i686 packages marked with "security-update" flag?

--------------------
# yum check-update 
Loaded plugins: changelog, fastestmirror, security
Loading mirror speeds from cached hostfile
 * base: centos.mirror.linuxwerk.com
 * epel: mirrors.n-ix.net
 * extras: centos.mirror.sharkservers.co.uk
 * updates: centos.mirror.sharkservers.co.uk

cyrus-sasl.x86_64                              2.1.23-15.el6_6.1                 updates
cyrus-sasl-devel.x86_64                        2.1.23-15.el6_6.1                 updates
cyrus-sasl-lib.x86_64                          2.1.23-15.el6_6.1                 updates
..
device-mapper-multipath-libs.x86_64            0.4.9-80.el6_6.1                  updates
..
libXfont.x86_64                                1.4.5-4.el6_6                     updates
..
nss-softokn.x86_64                             3.14.3-18.el6_6                   updates
nss-softokn-freebl.x86_64                      3.14.3-18.el6_6                   updates
..
perl-libs.x86_64                               4:5.10.1-136.el6_6.1              updates
--------------------

Cheers and thanks for your explanation / instruction

Gabriele