RPM Packaging Essentials

Speakers: Carl George, Robby Callicotte

Room: CC 202

Time: Sun 10:25 am – 11:55 am

Format: Hands-on Lab (90 min)

Difficulty: Some experience required

Track: OSS Distributions

Presenter Location: In-person

Experience: umpteenth time speaking

Description:

While universal package formats like Flatpak, Snap, and AppImage have grown in popularity, native system packages remain foundational to Linux distributions. Understanding how they work is essential for anyone who wants to contribute meaningfully to the Linux ecosystem.

This hands‑on workshop dives into RPM, the native package format used by Fedora, CentOS, and RHEL. RPM is a powerful, flexible system that plays a critical role in software distribution and system management. During this lab, attendees will:

Write RPM spec files

Build, inspect, and install RPM packages

Run RPM quality checks to ensure best practices

This workshop is ideal for developers, sysadmins, and engineers who want to understand how native packages are built and maintained. By the end, participants will have the confidence and foundational skills needed to create and maintain RPM packages effectively.

Prerequisites: Basic command‑line familiarity (running commands, editing files, navigating directories). Attendees must bring their own laptop. All exercises run in a browser‑based lab environment — no specific OS required.

Target Audience:

Developers

Sysadmins

Engineers