RPM Build Box

RPM build box setup

These are my notes from setting CentOS-4 for RPM package building on my home network. The same should apply for pretty much any version of CentOS or Red Hat.

• install base os
• update the os & kernel using yum update
• add my user mdf (uid 1000), add to wheel group
• add family group (gid 5000) just for grins
• setup sudoers by uncommenting line with #wheel nopasswd
• (If necessary) run lokkit and disable firewall (or enable just ssh)
• create build folders

mkdir -p redhat/{SPECS,SRPMS,RPMS,SOURCES,BUILD}

• configure ~/.rpmmacros

%_topdir     /home/user/redhat
%_rpmfilename   %%{ARCH}/%%{NAME}-%%{VERSION}-%%{RELEASE}.el4.%%{ARCH}.rpm
%_unpackaged_files_terminate_build 0
%_missing_doc_files_terminate_build 0

Adjust el4 in the %_rpmfilename to match the release, e.g. el3 or el5. Q. Is there an easier way?

Q. Is there are way to get the build packages to automatically go into el4/i386/RPMS/ ?)

• pull down rpmforge-release and install
  • See http://dag.wieers.com/rpm/FAQ.php#B1

• install development tools

yum groupinstall 'Development Tools'

• install screen and other packages not included in Development Tools

 yum install screen openssl-devel newt-devel pcre-devel libpcap-devel cups-devel \
 readline-devel postgresql-devel libxml2-devel cyrus-sasl-devel \
 gdbm-devel pam-devel libacl-devel libattr-devel openldap-devel \
 apr-util-devel byacc flex  gtk2-devel xorg-x11-devel kernel-smp-devel \
 createrepo repoview

Now I can drop into ~/redhat/SPECS and rpmbuild spec files.

cd redhat/SPECS
rpmbuild -ba dnstop.spec

• Optional: install vmware-tools

Now see RPMBuilding