[Rpm-maint] Maximum RPM: availability of single-file version and / or up-to-date sources

[Jeff Johnson]

> On Jul 22, 2018, at 7:45 AM, Ignat Semyonov <iksemyonov at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Hello RPM team!
> 
> I'm currently learning RPM packaging for work. For that, I use the Maximum RPM reference in its online HTML form as seen at [1]. While it is comfortable enough to read in a browser, it's not easy to print since it consists of a number of disconnected HTML pages (and I love reading hard copies of books, when available). Now, to quote [2],
> 
> > Red Hat is offering Maximum RPM v.2 for free download at http://www.rpm.org. What you'll find at www.rpm.org is the original copy of Maximum RPM in postscript format.
> 
> This appears to be incorrect, since I haven't been able to find the said PS in the ftp tree. Neither have I been able to locate a print version (i.e. an e-book version of the hard copy that you can buy used at Amazon).
> 

Quoting Jack Nicholson:

"You want the truth? You can't *HANDLE* the truth."

Shop whatever answer you wish to believe, from whomever seems credible or authoritative, public, private or heresay, about Red Hat and RPM and "Maximum RPM" attributions.

Good luck! I was there at the time.

Specific answers below.

> Thus, I have the following questions:
> 
> * Whether there is a single-file version of Maximum RPM available, matching the one at [1]

Yes multiple single file versions of "Maximum RPM" exist and are "available".

> * Whether the print version is freely available for download (and can be downloaded), as described by RedHat
> 

The "freely available" question needs to go to Red Hat legal for a written reply, and likely needs a clear concise definition of your usage case.

The "can be downloaded" begs the quite complex issues of authenticity and up-to-date.

> I'm also interested in a more in-depth reference to the modern macros and packaging process as used in the modern versions of Fedora and CentOS / RHEL. Is [4] enough?
> 

A more in-depth reference assumes RPM resources and efforts with a common goal. You are not the first person to suggest that better documentation could/should be done, the same RPM doco discussion starts up again every few years and (so far) never adequately delivers.

> P.S. Please note that as a result of a discussion we had in IRC, a version of the Maximum RPM source repo is now located at [3]. The last commit however is dated Dec 15, 2006, while the ftp directory was last modified on Feb 13, 2017, which makes me believe that the sources at [3] don't reflect the actual state of things.
> 

December 15, 2006 was the date that a RPM fork was publically announced, and is stamped on a Mercurial (the VCS used by Fedora at the time) glue file that has nothing to do with "Maximum RPM" in any printable format.

I would guess (but do not know) that February 13, 2017 is coincident with some infrastructure change within rpm.org hosting. Again, nothing to do with "Maximum RPM".

> [1] http://ftp.rpm.org/max-rpm/
> [2] https://www.redhat.com/en/about/press-releases/press-publishing
> [3] https://github.com/rpm-software-management/maximum-rpm
> [4] https://docs-old.fedoraproject.org/en-US/Fedora_Draft_Documentation/0.1/html/RPM_Guide/index.html
> 
> 
> --
> -- Best regards,
> Ignat Semenov
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