Investigating Packages with RPM

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Investigating Packages with RPM

The Red Hat Package Manager (RPM) handles the backend operation for the high-level package manager DNF. Although DNF provides all the functionality of RPM and more, you can still use RPM to gain information about software packages. In this hands-on lab, you will be tasked with querying and verifying RPM packages using the `rpm` command. *This lab is not approved or sponsored by Red Hat.*

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Lab Info

Level

Intermediate

Last updated

Sep 20, 2025

Duration

30m

Challenge

Query Installed Packages
- Use the rpm command to list all installed packages.
- Use the rpm command to find out which package owns the /usr/bin/iostat command.
  
  Display information about the package discovered.
  
  List the configuration files provided by the package discovered.
  
  View the changelog information about the package discovered.
- Use the rpm command to find out which package owns the /var/lib/dav file.
  
  Display information about the package.
  
  List the documentation files for the package.
  
  List the scripts that are used as part of the install and uninstall process package.
Challenge

Query Uninstalled Packages
- Use the rpm command to display information about the nginx-1.14.1-9.module+el8.0.0+4108+af250afe.x86_64.rpm file located in /home/cloud_user/rpms.
  
  List the dependencies for the package.
  
  List the configuration files for the package.
  
  View the changelog information for the package.
- Use the rpm command to display information about the vsftpd-3.0.3-36.el8.x86_64.rpm file located in /home/cloud_user/rpms.
  
  List all the files provided by the package.
  
  List the documentation files for the package.
  
  List the scripts that are used as part of the install and uninstall process for the package.
Challenge

Verify Packages
- Use the rpm command to verify the nmap and mtr packages.
- Use the rpm command to verify the sysstat package, but do not include group ownership in the verification.
- Use the rpm command to verify the httpd package, but do not include dependencies/capabilities and major/minor devices in the verification.

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