I just installed a program with urpmi, which is supposed to check for dependencies and make sure that all needed libraries are there. But it doesn't work, and I hope someone can tell me how to fix things, or at least get things back to the way they were before.

In the latest example, I installed a new version of K3b. (I bought a DVD+/-RW dual layer driver for US$80, but it wasn't well-supported on my current version in Mdk 10.0 OE.)

I said:

urpmi --noclean k3b


(I always use the --noclean version, so that any RPM's downloaded are not cleaned off. This way, if the installation goes wrong, I can redo it, and this time I don't need to download the files again --that can take a long time.)

... and my computer said:

To satisfy dependencies, the following packages are going to be installed (13 MB):
k3b-0.11.16-0.100.2thac.i586
libid3_3.8_3-3.8.3-6mdk.i586
libk3b2-0.11.16-0.100.2thac.i586
Is this OK? (Y/n)
[I said yes]

http://rpm.nyvalls.se/10.0/RPMS/./li...2thac.i586.rpm
http://rpm.nyvalls.se/10.0/RPMS/./k3...2thac.i586.rpm
ftp://mirror.cs.wisc.edu/pub/mirrors...-6mdk.i586.rpm
installing /var/cache/urpmi/rpms/libid3_3.8_3-3.8.3-6mdk.i586.rpm /var/cache/urpmi/rpms/libk3b2-0.11.16-0.100.2thac.i586.rpm /var/cache/urpmi/rpms/k3b-0.11.16-0.100.2thac.i586.rpm
Preparing... ##################################################
1:libid3_3.8_3 ##################################################
2:libk3b2 ##################################################
3:k3b ##################################################


So everything went well... or so it seems. But when I tried to run K3b, it started up briefly, and then I got an error message:


k3b: relocation error: k3b: undefined symbol: _ZN13KListViewItem10insertItemEP13QListViewItem

I think K3b was looking for something in a library that wasn't there... I wonder if it was looking for part of a library from Mdk version 10.1, but not finding it since I have Mdk 10.0?

This is not the first time this sort of thing has happened; I tried to install KDEgames and Kolourpain before, with the same problem.

So the question is: how do I know what library it's looking for, how do I find this library on the web and download it, or how do I revert to my old version?

You set up a repository for a Mandrake version that is not yours??? (i.e. are you installing 10.1 packages??). You should not do so.

To be honest, I had some issues with Mandrake 10.1 and the only solution for me was installing 10.2, it may be worth it downloading the 3 CDs (or buying them, and have them send to you or buy a magazine *with the 3 CD set* not 1 stripped CD).

Yes that error message is a dead giveaway that the k3b you're trying to use was compiled on a newer version of KDE. This is a problem with the RPMs you're using - Thac's. Did you check if there's a KDE update in that repo? It may not be possible to just upgrade K3b but Thac might intend you to upgrade the whole KDE to get it. Either look for instructions on his site or email him and ask him this.

Duhhh, no kidding! Do you think I would actually deliberately try to install a program that would need a newer library that overwrote all my old libraries?

Yes, in the past when I've had problems installing RPMs, it has always turned out to be a problem with Thac's version control. When you visit his site now, you will find that he is no longer maintaining Mandr{ake | iva} RPMs, just PCLinuxOs (or whatever the LiveCD version of Mandrake is). This is because of an argument he got into with someone on some forum criticizing his RPM control, and while the other person was quite nasty about it, the criticism was correct in that Thac's RPMs would get people in trouble because RPMs for (say) Mandrake 10.0 would depend on 10.1 libraries or newer. I took Thac's RPMs off the urpmi media list, and have never had a problem since.

This brings up a problem. It seems that, when I want to install a new version of a program (such as Krusader 1.60), I'll need the new libraries, which means I'll need a new version of Linux as well! I wonder if there's a way to run the new versions while using old libraries? Or is there not a way to have the old libraries and new libraries co-exist? Otherwise Linux is even worse than MSWindows because I'm constantly being forced to upgrade! Is it just Mandrake Linux that does this, or does RedHat/SUSe/Debian have this problem, too?

If you've got some program that needs KDE 3.4 and nothing earlier then you'll need to install KDE 3.4. Generally distros will ship with a particular version of KDE and upgrade it for the next release so yes Debian/Redhat/Suse have this problem too. If you want the next version of KDE then you can either get it from the development (ie. unstable) packages for your distro or from special package upgrades like Thac's. I know Suse provided KDE 3.4 RPMs as a special bonus for 9.2 since it only had 3.3. Beyond that just use the konstruct (or whatever its called) thing from the KDE website to build it from source.

Anyway there really is no point chasing the latest and greatest version numbers for software - you'll just end up with an unstable system. That's why most distros are on 6-month release cycles so you can keep up with new software. As for your DVD burner its probably a driver problem if its not well supported, not a k3b problem.

Microsoft tries to force customers to upgrade when they don't really need to in order to generate revenue. Linux and all the open-source projects that make up Linux distros are developed in an iterative way with frequent releases, far, far more frequent than equivalent closed-source software. Frequent upgrades are a natural consequence of the open source development process. Anyway you don't have to pay for it - just download the latest version of whatever distro you're using from their website.

Try this site for all of your urpmi needs:

http://easyurpmi.zarb.org/