Table of Contents
What is the Yum Package Manager?
Yum (Yellowdog Updater, Modified) is a package manager for Red Hat-based Linux distributions. It was developed by the Fedora Project and is now used in many popular distributions such as OpenSUSE, CentOS, Scientific Linux, Oracle Linux, and more. Yum allows users to download and install packages from repositories or local files quickly. It can also automatically resolve package dependencies.
Pros of Yum
- Automatically resolves package dependencies.
- Includes a yum-security plugin for security updates.
- Supports yum priorities for easy customization of repositories.
- A vast number of RPM repositories provide support.
Cons of Yum
- Not compatible with Debian-based distributions.
- Can be slow when downloading and updating large packages.
- Configuration can be complex for novice users.
- With no option for reverting upgrades, pinning is unavailable.
What is the APT Package Manager?
The Advanced Packaging Tool (APT) is a popular package management system used in Debian-based distributions. It was designed to simplify and streamline the process of installing, updating, and removing software packages. APT allows users to search for and install packages from online repositories as well as from local files. It also resolves package dependencies automatically.
Pros of Apt
- Automatically resolves package dependencies.
- Includes apt-secure to enable secure updates.
- User-friendly configuration and management options.
- Has a pinning feature that allows reverting upgrades.
- Faster than yum when downloading and updating large packages.
- Cons of Apt
- Not compatible with Red Hat-based distributions.
- Cannot remove the old package version without manual intervention.
- Configuration can be complex for novice users.
- Repositories are limited compared to yum.
Difference Between Yum and Apt-Get
It doesn’t matter which method you use to install; either “yum install package” or “apt-get install package” produces the same outcome.
Apt and yum are both package managers used in Linux operating systems. However, they differ in their usage, file formats, and storage locations.
Yum is mainly used in Red Hat-based distributions such as RHEL, Fedora, CentOS, Rocky Linux, OpenSUSE, etc. It uses an rpm package manager format and stores its files under /etc/yum.repos.d/ . Yum updates the list of packages automatically.
On the other hand, apt is primarily used in Debian- and Ubuntu-based distributions such as Debian, Ubuntu, Lubuntu, Kubuntu, etc. It uses a deb format and stores its files under the /etc/apt/sources.list directory . To receive the most recent packages, you need to run the command apt-get update.
Both tools offer the same core functionalities when it comes to installing packages. However, some key differences set them apart.
The following table shows an overview of the crucial differences between YUM and APT:
| Package Manager | YUM | APT |
|---|---|---|
| Used in | Red-Hat-based distros, such as RHEL, Fedora, CentOS, Rocky Linux, OpenSUSE, etc. | Debian and Ubuntu-based distros, such as Debian, Ubuntu, Lubuntu, Kubuntu, etc. |
| Supported Installation Package Format | .rpm files. | .deb files. |
| Configuration Files | /etc/yum.conf file with two sections. allows users to set YUM options with global and repository-specific effects. | /etc/apt/apt.conf file organized in a tree with options organized into functional groups. |
| Command Options | The most used yum options are:installremovesearchinfoupdate | The most used apt options are:updateupgradeinstallremovepurgelistsearch |
| Upgrades | The yum update command is used to upgrade the installed packages to the latest version. | The sudo apt upgrade command is used to upgrade all packages to the latest stable version. |
| Change Rollbacks | YUM allows any changes to be rolled back. | Allows changes to be rolled back by specifying the version you want to downgrade to. |
| GUI Front-End Support | Yumex and PackageKit. | Nala and Synaptic. |
