2.0 Linux Package Management Workflow

ZENworks provides an integrated package management system for Linux devices that helps you to easily manage the required software packages.

ZENworks enables you to use subscriptions to replicate content from NU, YUM, or RPM-MD, ZENworks Linux Management, and Static repositories.

Perform the tasks in the following table to manage and distribute Linux packages:

Tasks

Details

  • Create Subscriptions

To replicate the required content to the ZENworks Primary Servers, create subscriptions. After the subscription runs, the required bundles will be created with the content in the remote repositories.

For more information on creating and managing subscriptions, see Section II, Subscriptions.

NOTE:While creating a subscription, in the Subscription Summary page, ensure that you select the Patches option in the Bundle options section.

  • Bundle Distribution

The bundles created in the above step can be exposed as YUM repositories to update the target devices.

For more information, see Managing Bundle Assignments in the ZENworks Software Distribution Reference.

  • Creating and Managing YUM Services

The YUM repository created in the above step can be added to YaST, Zypper, or YUM, or to any tool that understands the format of the YUM repository to pull the applicable updates.

For more information on creating see, Creating and Managing YUM Services for Bundles on Linux Devices.

NOTE:For each subscription that you create, a bundle or bundle group will be created automatically. A bundle will be created for Pool/update channels and a bundle group will be created when patches are selected. Ensure that you create YUM repos for all these bundles and bundle groups and add the created repos to the managed devices.

  • Adding Repositories on Agents

The ZENworks agent uses packages from various ZENworks bundles libraries for dependency resolution. You can either add the YUM repositories created in the above step manually, or use an external Service policy to deploy them to devices.

For more information on how to add the repositories on the managed devices, see Adding Repositories.

For ease of adding repositories to multiple devices in your zone, you can use an external service policy. For more information, see External Services Policies in the ZENworks Best Practices Guide and Section 9.0, Subscribing to External Services.

  • Distribution Upgrade

To apply patches on the target devices, run the zypper patch command. For more information, see Applying Patches.