Actually, this is not RPM Hell but rather crappy packaging hell:

[root@sam70 ~]# rpmbuild –rebuild xen-3.1.0-10.fc8.src.rpm
Installing xen-3.1.0-10.fc8.src.rpm
error: Failed build dependencies:
transfig is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
libidn-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
texi2html is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
SDL-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
curl-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
libX11-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
python-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
ghostscript is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
tetex-latex is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
gtk2-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
libaio-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
/usr/include/gnu/stubs-32.h is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
dev86 is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
gnutls-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64
openssl-devel is needed by xen-3.1.0-10.x86_64

Picking only one example from this list: why on earth does xen need gtk2-devel?

Let’s just grin, and do as requested, after all, it’s not as if I had a choice. After figuring out that /usr/include/gnu/stubs-32.h is actually provided by glibc-devel (and the src.rpm building machine didn’t know it…)

[root@sam70 ~]# yum install transfig libidn-devel texi2html SDL-devel curl-devel libX11-devel python-devel ghostscript tetex-latex gtk2-devel libaio-devel glibc-devel dev86 gnutls-devel openssl-devel
Loading « installonlyn » plugin
Setting up Install Process
Setting up repositories
base 100% |=========================| 1.1 kB 00:00
updates 100% |=========================| 951 B 00:00
addons 100% |=========================| 951 B 00:00
extras 100% |=========================| 1.1 kB 00:00
Reading repository metadata in from local files
primary.xml.gz 100% |=========================| 341 kB 00:01
updates : ################################################## 817/817
Added 12 new packages, deleted 0 old in 1.03 seconds
[…]

Transaction Summary
=============================================================================
Install 76 Package(s)
Update 0 Package(s)
Remove 0 Package(s)

Total download size: 116 M
Is this ok [y/N]: y

Now everything’s downloaded…

Transaction Check Error:
file /usr/share/man/man1/asn1parse.1ssl.gz from install of openssl-0.9.8b-8.3.el5 conflicts with file from package openssl-0.9.8b-8.3.el5
file /usr/share/man/man1/nseq.1ssl.gz from install of openssl-0.9.8b-8.3.el5 conflicts with file from package openssl-0.9.8b-8.3.el5
file /usr/share/man/man1/ocsp.1ssl.gz from install of openssl-0.9.8b-8.3.el5 conflicts with file from package openssl-0.9.8b-8.3.el5
file /usr/share/man/man1/smime.1ssl.gz from install of openssl-0.9.8b-8.3.el5 conflicts with file from package openssl-0.9.8b-8.3.el5

That’s actually due to openssl-devel package pulling in i386 and x86_64 versions of the openssl package, which happily conflict due to both of them shipping… the same manpages! I wonder how they manage to get automated builds working. (Solving that: rpm -ivh –force –nodeps /var/cache/yum/base/packages/openssl-* . Doesn’t look like chainsaw work at all…)

As a bonus, note how the error message doesn’t indicate at all that the two conflicting packages, even if they’re named the same, are not actually the same, given both of them are for different architectures.

Sigh. Thanks, RedHat.