.\" Man page generated from reStructuredText .\" by the Docutils 0.22.3 manpage writer. . . .nr rst2man-indent-level 0 . .de1 rstReportMargin \\$1 \\n[an-margin] level \\n[rst2man-indent-level] level margin: \\n[rst2man-indent\\n[rst2man-indent-level]] - \\n[rst2man-indent0] \\n[rst2man-indent1] \\n[rst2man-indent2] .. .de1 INDENT .\" .rstReportMargin pre: . RS \\$1 . nr rst2man-indent\\n[rst2man-indent-level] \\n[an-margin] . nr rst2man-indent-level +1 .\" .rstReportMargin post: .. .de UNINDENT . RE .\" indent \\n[an-margin] .\" old: \\n[rst2man-indent\\n[rst2man-indent-level]] .nr rst2man-indent-level -1 .\" new: \\n[rst2man-indent\\n[rst2man-indent-level]] .in \\n[rst2man-indent\\n[rst2man-indent-level]]u .. .TH "DNF5-SPECS" "7" "Jan 19, 2026" "" "dnf5" .SH NAME dnf5-specs \- Patterns Specification .SH DESCRIPTION .sp Different pattern matching rules for arguments in \fB*\-spec\fP form are defined for operation with each entity type in \fBDNF5\fP\&. In this section all rules are described and explained in detail, with examples. .SH GLOBS .sp Pattern specification supports the same glob pattern matching that shell does. The following patterns are supported: .INDENT 0.0 .TP .B \fB*\fP Matches any number of characters. .TP .B \fB?\fP Matches any single character. .TP .B \fB[]\fP Matches any one of the enclosed characters. A pair of characters separated by a hyphen denotes a range expression; any character that falls between those two characters, inclusive, is matched. If the first character following the \fB[\fP is a \fB!\fP or a \fB^\fP then any character not enclosed is matched. .UNINDENT .sp Note: Curly brackets (\fB{}\fP) are not supported. You can still use them in shells that support them and let the shell do the expansion, but if quoted or escaped, \fBDNF5\fP will not expand them. .SH PACKAGES .sp Many commands take a \fB\fP parameter that selects a package for the operation. Depending on the command the \fB\fP argument is matched against: .INDENT 0.0 .IP \(bu 2 NEVRA [N] or case Insentive NEVRA [NI] .IP \(bu 2 Provides [P] .IP \(bu 2 File provides [F] .IP \(bu 2 Binaries [B] .UNINDENT .sp sequentially until a match is found. .sp For example \fB\fP is first matched against NEVRAs and if no matching NEVRA is found it is matched against Provides. .sp When \fB\fP is a package name or a provide, the user can provide additional restriction rules for matching the arguments. Basic version comparisons can be used for this purpose (=, >, <, >=, <=), like this \fB >= \fP, where the \fB\fP argument is in a \fB[EPOCH:]VERSION[\-RELEASE]\fP format as specified in the NEVRA matching section. .sp To build more complex expressions, a rich dependency feature is also supported, which is always enclosed in parentheses. Boolean operators and nesting can be used, f.e. \fB( or ( and ))\fP\&. For more information, please see RPM boolean dependencies\&. .SS NEVRA matching .sp Each package can be uniquely identified by the \fINEVRA\fP string. It consists of 5 parts of information: .INDENT 0.0 .TP .B \fIName\fP .nf Package name. .fi .sp .TP .B \fIEpoch\fP .nf Epoch number. It is not always included. .fi .sp .sp The epoch number overrides other version checking, so it can be used to force the package upgrade over some other one. .TP .B \fIVersion\fP .nf Version string. It is not strictly numeric. It is intended to match the upstream software version. .fi .sp .TP .B \fIRelease\fP .nf Edition string. .fi .sp .sp It is an information about the particular package build, usually a number increased with the newer build. It is not connected with the upstream software. .TP .B \fIArchitecture\fP .nf Target architecture string. Defines the processor type the package is intended to be installed on. .fi .sp .sp It can be also a package containing source files (\fBsrc\fP) or architecture\-independent package (\fBnoarch\fP). .UNINDENT .sp When matching against NEVRAs, partial matching is supported. \fBDNF5\fP tries to match the spec against the following list of NEVRA forms (in decreasing order of priority): .INDENT 0.0 .INDENT 3.5 .nf \fBNAME\-[EPOCH:]VERSION\-RELEASE.ARCH\fP \fBNAME.ARCH\fP \fBNAME\fP \fBNAME\-[EPOCH:]VERSION\-RELEASE\fP \fBNAME\-[EPOCH:]VERSION\fP .fi .sp .UNINDENT .UNINDENT .sp Note that \fIname\fP can in general contain dashes (e.g. \fBpackage\-with\-dashes\fP). .sp The first form that matches any packages is used and the remaining forms are not tried. If none of the forms match any packages, an attempt is made to match the \fB\fP against full package NEVRAs. This is only relevant if globs are present in the \fB\fP\&. .sp You can specify globs as part of any of the five NEVRA components. You can also specify a glob pattern to match over multiple NEVRA components (in other words, to match across the NEVRA separators). In that case, however, you need to write the spec to match against full package NEVRAs, as it is not possible to split such spec into NEVRA forms. .SS File Provides matching .sp If a \fBspec\fP starts with either \fB/\fP or \fB*/\fP, it is considered as a potential file provide. .SS Binaries matching .sp Whether to consider package binaries during matching. Checks if given \fBspec\fP is a binary in \fB/usr/bin/\fP or \fB/usr/sbin/\fP\&. .SH COMPS .sp \fB\(ga\(ga|\(ga\(ga\fP allows one to select groups|environments a particular operation should work on. It is a case insensitive string (supporting globbing characters) that is matched against a group\(aqs|environment\(aqs ID, canonical name and name translated into the current \fBLC_MESSAGES\fP locale (if possible). .sp Comps \fBspecs\fP are prefixed by \fB@\fP for commands that also accept package \fBspecs\fP\&. For example see \fBdnf5\-install(8)\fP, Install Command \%<#\:install-command-ref-label>\&. .SH MODULES .sp \fB\fP allows one to select modules or profiles a particular operation should work on. .sp Since \fINEVRA\fP matching form is insufficient for modules, they are uniquely identified by the \fINSVCA\fP format (\fBNAME:STREAM:VERSION:CONTEXT:ARCH/PROFILE\fP). Supported partial forms are the following: .INDENT 0.0 .INDENT 3.5 .nf \fBNAME\fP \fBNAME:STREAM\fP \fBNAME:STREAM:VERSION\fP \fBNAME:STREAM:VERSION:CONTEXT\fP All above combinations with \fB::ARCH\fP (e.g. \fBNAME::ARCH\fP) \fBNAME:STREAM:VERSION:CONTEXT:ARCH\fP All above combinations with \fB/PROFILE\fP (e.g. \fBNAME/PROFILE\fP) .fi .sp .UNINDENT .UNINDENT .sp In case stream is not specified, the enabled or the default stream is used, in this order. In case profile is not specified, the system default profile or the \(aqdefault\(aq profile is used. .SH TRANSACTIONS .sp \fB\fP can be in one of several forms. If it is an integer, it specifies a transaction ID. Specifying \fBlast\fP is the same as specifying the ID of the most recent transaction. The last form is \fBlast\-\fP, where \fB\fP is a positive integer. It specifies offset\-th transaction preceding the most recent transaction. .SH SEE ALSO .INDENT 0.0 .TP .B RPM boolean dependencies: .nf \% .fi .sp .UNINDENT .SH Author See AUTHORS.md in dnf5 source distribution. .SH Copyright Contributors to the dnf5 project. .\" End of generated man page.