yum How to Use YUM in Linux

[Linux Hint]

YUM, or also known as Yellowdog Updater Modified, is a package management tool developed by Yellowdog Linux. It is the default and widely used software package manager in Fedora, RHEL, CentOS Linux systems, etc. Its primary features allow you to install, upgrade, and uninstall software packages on your devices. YUM has been a reliable tool and evolved into its next-generation version, Dandified YUM(DNF). Furthermore, you can easily access YUM through the command line, making it the preferred choice of most administrators.

However, many users still need to discover and want to learn various use cases of YUM. This quick guide will briefly describe YUM in Linux and demonstrate some examples of its use.

How to Use YUM in Linux

You can install any new software using a simple yum install command followed by your desired package name. For example, to install the r sync utility, we would use:

yum install rsync

Additionally, you do not need to worry about the dependencies the new packages need because YUM takes care of it all. You can use the below-given command to update any particular package:

yum update package_name

Please replace ‘package_name’ with the package name you want to update. For instance, let’s update the curl utility:

yum update curl

Similarly you can completely remove a package from your system through the following command:

yum remove package_name

Again replace ‘package_name’ like shown in the above section. After executing this command, enter ‘y’ to confirm the removal of your target package and its dependencies.  For example, if we have to remove the curl package installed in the previous section, we will run:

yum remove curl

If you want to view detailed information about a package before installing it immediately, use the yum info command. For example:

yum info curl

It will display information about Curl’s latest version, release, size, license, and description. You can also take a brief look at the packages installed on your system by running:

yum list installed

In case you are unable to recall the exact name of your desired package, use the search function as follows:

yum search [specific_keyword]

Just replace [specific_keyword] with your target keyword. It will show all the matching package names.

A Quick Summary

YUM is the default package management utility in Fedora, RHEL, CentOS, and other similar Linux distributions that the Yellowdog Linux originally developed. This guide quickly explained YUM in Linux with the help of multiple examples. Here, we demonstrated how to use YUM to install, remove, and upgrade packages on your systems. 

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