How to Find a Yum Package – Smart Web Developer

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Yum (Yellowdog Updater Modified) is a utility for finding, installing, updating and removing software on Linux. It runs on rpm-compatible Linux distributions, e.g. RedHat, Fedora, SUSE, CentOS, Mandriva.

### Get the Yum Package Name by Just Using the Software’s Name

When you want to install some software, sometimes you’re lucky and can use the software’s name. For example, installing the GNU screen terminal utility is as simple as:

    sudo yum install screen

Guessing the package name doesn’t always work. For example, try installing vim (an improved vi text editor with syntax highlighting) with just the package name vim:

    [root@sayonara ~]# yum install vim
    Loaded plugins: fastestmirror
    Loading mirror speeds from cached hostfile
     * rpmforge: ftp-stud.fht-esslingen.de
     * base: centos.aol.com
     * updates: mirror.nexcess.net
     * addons: centos.aol.com
     * extras: centos.mirror.seiri.com
    Setting up Install Process
    Parsing package install arguments
    No package vim available.
    Nothing to do

In this case yum reports: `No package vim available`.

Similarly, trying to install the MySQL database with just `mysql` as the package name, will probably result in the same error `No package mysql available`:

    sudo yum install mysql

Are vim and MySQL really not available for installation with yum?

### Find a Yum Package Using Yum Search

The following yum command searches for different pacakages mentioning `vim`:

    [root@sayonara ~]# yum search vim
    Loaded plugins: fastestmirror, priorities
    Loading mirror speeds from cached hostfile
    * rpmforge: ftp-stud.fht-esslingen.de
    ================================================================================= Matched: vim =================================================================================
    vim-X11.i386 : The VIM version of the vi editor for the X Window System.
    vim-common.i386 : The common files needed by any version of the VIM editor.
    vim-enhanced.i386 : A version of the VIM editor which includes recent enhancements.
    vim-minimal.i386 : A minimal version of the VIM editor.

Then just pick the package you want to install, for example:

    sudo yum install vim-minimal.i386

Another example is looking for the package to install MySQL:

    [root@sayonara ~]# yum search mysql
    Loaded plugins: fastestmirror
    Loading mirror speeds from cached hostfile
     * rpmforge: ftp-stud.fht-esslingen.de
     * base: mirror.rackspace.com
     * updates: mirror.cs.vt.edu
     * addons: yum.singlehop.com
     * extras: mirror.cs.vt.edu
    =================================================================== Matched: mysql ====================================================================
    mod_auth_mysql.i386 : Basic authentication for the Apache web server using a MySQL database.
    qt-MySQL.i386 : MySQL drivers for Qt's SQL classes.
    MySQL-python.i386 : An interface to MySQL
    aimsniff.i386 : Monitor and archive AOL Instant Messenger messages
    apr-util-mysql.i386 : APR utility library MySQL DBD driver
    bytefx-data-mysql.i386 : Database connectivity for Mono
    cacti.noarch : Complete network graphing solution designed on top of RRDTool
    cacti-docs.noarch : Documentation for the cacti network graphing solution
    freeradius-mysql.i386 : MySQL bindings for freeradius
    freeradius2-mysql.i386 : MySQL support for freeradius
    gtksql.i386 : Graphical database query tool for MySQL and PostgreSQL
    krecipes.i386 : Recipe manager
    libdbi-dbd-mysql.i386 : MySQL plugin for libdbi
    lighttpd-mod_mysql_vhost.i386 : Virtual host module for lighttpd that uses a MySQL database
    motion.i386 : Video-surveilance system
    mtop.noarch : Tool to monitor a MySQL database
    mysql.i386 : MySQL client programs and shared libraries.
    mysql-bench.i386 : MySQL benchmark scripts and data
    mysql-connector-odbc.i386 : ODBC driver for MySQL
    mysql-devel.i386 : Files for development of MySQL applications
    mysql-server.i386 : The MySQL server and related files.
    mysql-test.i386 : The test suite distributed with MySQL
    mytop.noarch : Top clone for MySQL
    nagios-plugins.i386 : Host/service/network monitoring program plugins for Nagios
    ndoutils.i386 : Nagios plugin to store Nagios data in a relational database
    pdns-backend-mysql.i386 : MySQL backend for pdns
    perl-Acme-BeyondPerl-ToSQL.noarch : Perl module to have RDBMS calculate instead of Perl
    perl-Class-DBI-mysql.noarch : Perl module that extends Class::DBI for MySQL
    perl-DBD-MySQL.i386 : A MySQL interface for perl
    perl-DBD-SQLite.i386 : Small fast embedded SQL database engine
    perl-DBD-mysql.i386 : Perl module that implements a MySQL driver for DBI
    perl-DBIx-TableHash.noarch : Tie a hash to a mysql table + SQL utils
    perl-DBIx-TextIndex.i386 : full-text searching in SQL databases
    perl-DNS-BL.noarch : Manage DNS black lists
    perl-DateTime-Format-MySQL.noarch : Perl module to parse and format MySQL dates and times
    perl-MySQL-Config.noarch : Perl module to parse and utilize MySQL's /etc/my.cnf and ~/.my.cnf files
    perl-Qmail-Mysql.noarch : Perl module for mysql database used by qmail-mysql
    perl-Time-Piece-MySQL.noarch : Perl module adds MySQL-specific methods to Time::Piece
    php-adodb.noarch : Portable Database Library for PHP
    php-mysql.i386 : A module for PHP applications that use MySQL databases.
    php-pdo.i386 : A database access abstraction module for PHP applications
    php-pear-MDB2-Driver-mysql.noarch : MySQL MDB2 driver
    php-pecl-session_mysql.i386 : PECL package to save sessions to a MySQL database
    phpmyadmin.noarch : Web application to manage MySQL
    proftpd-mysql.i386 : Module to add MySQL support to the ProFTPD FTP server
    pure-ftpd.i386 : Lightweight, fast and secure FTP server
    python-sqlalchemy.noarch : SQL toolkit and object relational mapper for Python
    qt4-mysql.i386 : MySQL drivers for Qt's SQL classes
    rsyslog.i386 : Enhanced system logging and kernel message trapping daemons
    rsyslog-mysql.i386 : MySQL support for rsyslog
    sphinx.i386 : Free open-source SQL full-text search engine
    synbak.noarch : Universal backup system
    sysbench.i386 : System performance benchmark
    unixODBC.i386 : A complete ODBC driver manager for Linux.

Looking over the available packages, the package for installing the MySQL database would be `mysql-server.i386`.

More information is available at the yum homepage.

- Tags
  CentOS, Linux