rh_advisory_update: Automatically install RPMs from RH advisory emails

I've always been too cheap to pay for Red Hat's RHN / up2date service, and have been happy just doing updates manually. When I got an advisory from the redhat-watch-list
(<http://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/redhat-watch-list>), or Bugtraq, if that copy showed up first, I'd wget the appropriate URLs therein, cross-check the MD5 hashes in the mail against 'md5sum' output, check the embedded MD5 hashes and signatures with 'rpm --checksig', and then install.

Thought about writing a script to automate that, but never got around to it. The *huge* KDE update from the other day finally pushed me into it, though. Way too many RPMs in that update to comfortably handle manually.

First, of course, I looked around to see what tools already existed to do this, and found a bunch (rhupdate, rh_update, etc.), but they weren't quite what I was looking for. For instance, they keyed off of the FTP or web site rather than an advisory email, and thus didn't reap the security benefit of a crypto hash delivered via an alternate communications channel. Also they had complex features I didn't need and complex setup I didn't want (e.g. related to unmanned installs).

Therefore I wrote my own script, rh_advisory_update:

    http://harkless.org/dan/software/#rh_advisory_update

If you pass it a Red Hat Security Advisory or Bug Fix Advisory email on stdin, it'll automatically download, double-verify (with md5sum and 'rpm
--checksig') and install the appropriate RPMs for your architecture and Red
Hat release.

I've done a fair amount of testing and believe the script to be bug-free, but if you encounter any problems, please let me know.

Do you need help?

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Dan Harkless
sectools@harkless.org
http://harkless.org/dan/ Received on Wed May 14 11:26:58 2003