Yum update error - Requires: python26-ordereddict

Question

Today I tried to update our Amazon Linux servers and got the following error message:

$ sudo yum update
---> Package python26-ordereddict.noarch 0:1.1-2.5.amzn1 will be obsoleted
--> Processing Dependency: python26-ordereddict = 1.1 for package: python26-bcdoc-0.16.0-1.9.amzn1.noarch
--> Finished Dependency Resolution
Error: Package: python26-bcdoc-0.16.0-1.9.amzn1.noarch (@amzn-updates)
           Requires: python26-ordereddict = 1.1
           Removing: python26-ordereddict-1.1-2.5.amzn1.noarch (@amzn-main)
               python26-ordereddict = 1.1-2.5.amzn1
           Obsoleted By: python26-2.6.9-2.83.amzn1.x86_64 (amzn-updates)
               python26-ordereddict = 1.2
 You could try using --skip-broken to work around the problem
 You could try running: rpm -Va --nofiles --nodigest

This is a Apache PHP webserver, and we don't use Python for web development, but Linux needs it apparently, and maybe some package that Apache uses needs this - no idea! This error appeared on several servers.

Questions

• Is it safe to use sudo yum update --skip-broken, or can that break things?
• What does rpm -Va --nofiles --nodigest do and what is the risk?
• How can I resolve this apparent dependency problem?

Answer 1

This command is safe. It skips all packages with broken dependencies:

sudo yum update --skip-broken

You can verify all packages skiping checksum validation, yes it is safe:

rpm -Va --nofiles --nodigest

Suppose, you can't resolve this, after few days the dependencies will appear in repo. Also you can make bugreport to yours distro vendor.

Answer 2

I had to find the same package as a dependency for salt-minion. Its on EPEL, so you probably want to do something like this, to set up the new repository.

yum install epel-release-5-4
yum install python26-ordereddict

Versions will change over time - make sure you get what you need.