The Fermi Red Hat Linux basis of installation is RPM. RPM is a program that can be used to install, uninstall, query, verify, and build software packages. It is also available for other platforms such as Sun, DEC, etc.

I. RPM Particulars
 

A. The RPM Package Name Components
1. packagename-version-patchlevel.architecture.rpm
 
a. i.e., XFree86-3.3.2.3-18.i386.rpm
packagename - XFree86
version - 3.3.2.3
patchlevel - 18
architecture - i386 (i.e., Intel based)
rpm

B. RPM Database Files
 
1. Several database files reside in /var/lib/rpm describing what is currently installed on a system. You can't really do anything with them outside of RPM. This is simply where they live.
 
confilictsindex.rpm
fileindex.rpm
groupindex.rpm
nameindex.rpm
packages.rpm
providesindex.rpm
requiredby.rpm
triggerindex.rpm