1DNF.MODULARITY(7) DNF DNF.MODULARITY(7)
2
6 dnf.modularity - Modularity in DNF
7 Modularity is new way of building, organizing and delivering packages.
9 For more details see: https://docs.pagure.org/modularity/
10
12 modulemd
13 Every repository can contain modules metadata with modulemd doc‐
14 uments. These documents hold metadata about modules such as
15 Name, Stream or list of packages.
16 (non-modular) package
18 Package that doesn't belong to a module.
19 modular package
21 Package that belongs to a module. It is listed in modulemd under
22 the artifacts section. Modular packages can be also identified
23 by having %{modularitylabel} RPM header set.
24 (module) stream
26 Stream is a collection of packages, a virtual repository. It is
27 identified with Name and Stream from modulemd separated with
28 colon, for example "postgresql:9.6".
29 Module streams can be active or inactive. active means the RPM
31 packages from this stream are included in the set of available
32 packages. Packages from inactive streams are filtered out.
33 Streams are active either if marked as default or if they are
34 explicitly enabled by a user action. Streams that satisfy depen‐
35 dencies of default or enabled streams are also considered
36 active. Only one stream of a particular module can be active at
37 a given point in time.
38
40 Without modules, packages with the highest version are used by default.
41 Module streams can distribute packages with lower versions than avail‐
43 able in the repositories available to the operating system. To make
44 such packages available for installs and upgrades, the non-modular
45 packages are filtered out when they match by name with modular packages
46 from any existing stream.
47
49 In special cases, a user wants to cherry-pick individual packages pro‐
50 vided outside module streams and make them available on along with
51 packages from the active streams. Under normal circumstances, such
52 packages are filtered out. To make the system use packages from a
53 repository regardless of their modularity, specify module_hotfixes=true
54 in the .repo file. This protects the repository from package filtering.
55 Please note the hotfix packages do not override module packages, they
57 only become part of available package set. It's the package Epoch, Ver‐
58 sion and Release what determines if the package is the latest.
59
61 Repositories with module metadata are unavailable
62 When a repository with module metadata is unavailable, package filter‐
63 ing must keep working. Non-modular RPMs must remain unavailable and
64 must never get on the system.
65 This happens when:
67 · user disables a repository via --disablerepo or uses --repoid
69 · user removes a .repo file from disk
71 · repository is not available and has skip_if_unavailable=true
73 DNF keeps copies of the latest modulemd for every active stream and
75 uses them if there's no modulemd available for the stream. This keeps
76 package filtering working correctly.
77 The copies are made any time a transaction is resolved and started.
79 That includes RPM transactions as well as any dnf module <enable|dis‐
80 able|reset> operations.
81 When the fail-safe data is used, dnf show such modules as part of @mod‐
83 ulefailsafe repository.
84 Orphaned modular packages
86 All packages that are built as a part of a module have %{modularityla‐
87 bel} RPM header set. If such package becomes part of RPM transaction
88 and cannot be associated with any available modulemd, DNF prevents from
89 getting it on the system (package is available, but cannot be
90 installed, upgraded, etc.)
91
93 See AUTHORS in DNF source distribution.
94
96 2012-2020, Red Hat, Licensed under GPLv2+
974.2.21 Apr 08, 2020 DNF.MODULARITY(7)