What is the minimum I have to do to create an RPM file?

Question

I just want to create an RPM file to distribute my Linux binary \"foobar\", with only a couple of dependencies. It has a config file, /etc/foobar.conf and should be installe

Answer 1

I often do binary rpm per packaging proprietary apps - also moster as websphere - on linux. So my experience could be useful also a you, besides that it would better to do a TRUE RPM if you can. But i digress.

So the a basic step for packaging your (binary) program is as follow - in which i suppose the program is toybinprog with version 1.0, have a conf to be installed in /etc/toybinprog/toybinprog.conf and have a bin to be installed in /usr/bin called tobinprog :

1. create your rpm build env for RPM < 4.6,4.7

mkdir -p ~/rpmbuild/{RPMS,SRPMS,BUILD,SOURCES,SPECS,tmp}

cat <<EOF >~/.rpmmacros
%_topdir   %(echo $HOME)/rpmbuild
%_tmppath  %{_topdir}/tmp
EOF

cd ~/rpmbuild

2. create the tarball of your project

mkdir toybinprog-1.0
mkdir -p toybinprog-1.0/usr/bin
mkdir -p toybinprog-1.0/etc/toybinprog
install -m 755 toybinprog toybinprog-1.0/usr/bin
install -m 644 toybinprog.conf toybinprog-1.0/etc/toybinprog/

tar -zcvf toybinprog-1.0.tar.gz toybinprog-1.0/

3. Copy to the sources dir

cp toybinprog-1.0.tar.gz SOURCES/

cat <<EOF > SPECS/toybinprog.spec
# Don't try fancy stuff like debuginfo, which is useless on binary-only
# packages. Don't strip binary too
# Be sure buildpolicy set to do nothing
%define        __spec_install_post %{nil}
%define          debug_package %{nil}
%define        __os_install_post %{_dbpath}/brp-compress

Summary: A very simple toy bin rpm package
Name: toybinprog
Version: 1.0
Release: 1
License: GPL+
Group: Development/Tools
SOURCE0 : %{name}-%{version}.tar.gz
URL: http://toybinprog.company.com/

BuildRoot: %{_tmppath}/%{name}-%{version}-%{release}-root

%description
%{summary}

%prep
%setup -q

%build
# Empty section.

%install
rm -rf %{buildroot}
mkdir -p  %{buildroot}

# in builddir
cp -a * %{buildroot}


%clean
rm -rf %{buildroot}


%files
%defattr(-,root,root,-)
%config(noreplace) %{_sysconfdir}/%{name}/%{name}.conf
%{_bindir}/*

%changelog
* Thu Apr 24 2009  Elia Pinto <devzero2000@rpm5.org> 1.0-1
- First Build

EOF

4. build the source and the binary rpm

rpmbuild -ba SPECS/toybinprog.spec

And that's all.

Hope this help

Answer 2

Process of generating RPM from source file:

1. download source file with.gz extention.
2. install rpm-build and rpmdevtools from yum install. (rpmbuild folder will be generated...SPECS,SOURCES,RPMS.. folders will should be generated inside the rpmbuild folder).
3. copy the source code.gz to SOURCES folder.(rpmbuild/SOURCES)
4. Untar the tar ball by using the following command. go to SOURCES folder :rpmbuild/SOURCES where tar file is present. command: e.g tar -xvzf httpd-2.22.tar.gz httpd-2.22 folder will be generated in the same path.
5. go to extracted folder and then type below command: ./configure --prefix=/usr/local/apache2 --with-included-apr --enable-proxy --enable-proxy-balancer --with-mpm=worker --enable-mods-static=all (.configure may vary according to source for which RPM has to built-- i have done for apache HTTPD which needs apr and apr-util dependency package).
6. run below command once the configure is successful: make
7. after successfull execution od make command run: checkinstall in tha same folder. (if you dont have checkinstall software please download latest version from site) Also checkinstall software has bug which can be solved by following way::::: locate checkinstallrc and then replace TRANSLATE = 1 to TRANSLATE=0 using vim command. Also check for exclude package: EXCLUDE="/selinux"
8. checkinstall will ask for option (type R if you want tp build rpm for source file)
9. Done .rpm file will be built in RPMS folder inside rpmbuild/RPMS file... ALL the BEST ....

Answer 3

RPMs are usually built from source, not the binaries.

You need to write the spec file that covers how to configure and compile your application; also, which files to include in your RPM.

A quick glance at the manual shows that most of what you need is covered in Chapter 8 -- also, as most RPM-based distributions have sources available, there's literally a zillion of examples of different approaches you could look at.