[ale] source from an rpm file?

[Chris Ricker]

On 11 May, Linux Idiot wrote:
> I've checked out the man page for rpm, but haven't found an answer to
> this question.  Is it possible to upack an rpm into the actual source
> files?

It depends on what rpm you have.  RPMs are either precompiled
binary-only packages, which are named foo-release #-arch.rpm, or
a package of source, patch, and build instructions, which are named
foo-release 3-src.rpm (and are often just called SRPMs).  If the package
you've got ends in .i386.rpm (or .sparc.rpm or whatever), it only
contains binaries and there's no source to extract.  If it ends in
.src.rpm, then you can unpack it into source.

In either case, rpm files are standard cpio files, plus a binary
header.  There's a util available (rpm2cpio) which strips the header
off, leaving you a cpio file which you can then open.

later,
chris