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rpmdb(8) — Linux manual page

NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | OPERATIONS | OPTIONS | CONFIGURATION | EXIT STATUS | EXAMPLES | OPTIONS | SEE ALSO | COLOPHON 

RPMDB(8)                 System Manager's Manual                 RPMDB(8)

NAME         top

       rpmdb - RPM Database Tool

SYNOPSIS         top

   Maintenance
       rpmdb [options] {--initdb|--rebuilddb|--parkdb}

   Diagnostics
       rpmdb [options] {--verifydb}

   Migration
       rpmdb [options] {--exportdb|--importdb}

DESCRIPTION         top

       The rpmdb tool is used for low-level rpm database operations.

OPERATIONS         top

   Maintenance
       --initdb
           Create a new database if one doesn't already exist. An
           existing database is not overwritten.

       --rebuilddb
           Rebuild the database from the installed package headers.
           Discards any unreadable (corrupt) headers and compacts the
           database in case it has grown large over time.

           Can also be used to convert between different rpmdb formats.

       --parkdb
           Park the database. Prepares and optimizes the database for
           inclusion on read-only media, such as immutable OS images.

           Write operations, such as RPM transactions, will unpark the
           database and continue normally, leaving the database unparked
           when finished. Thus, to unpark manually, use --rebuilddb.

           Depending on the backend used, this operation may include the
           removal of auxiliary, backend-specific files from disk, such
           as the write-ahead log or shared memory index, and thus
           facilitate bit-for-bit reproducible OS images.

   Diagnostics
       --verifydb
           Perform a low-level integrity check on the database. Rarely
           useful, for system health rpm --verify -a is a far more
           meaningful operation.

   Migration
       --exportdb
           Export the database in header-list format, suitable for
           transporting to another host or database type. The data is
           output to standard output.

       --importdb
           Imports a database from a header-list format as created by
           --exportdb. The data is read from standard input.

OPTIONS         top

       See rpm-common(8) for the options common to all rpm executables.

CONFIGURATION         top

       There are several configurables affecting the rpmdb operations,
       but in particular the following (see rpm-config(5) for details):
       •   %_dbpath
       •   %_db_backend

EXIT STATUS         top

       On success, 0 is returned, a nonzero failure code otherwise.

EXAMPLES         top

       rpmdb --initdb --dbpath /tmp/testdb
           Initialize a new database in /tmp/testdb directory.

       rpmdb --rebuilddb
           Rebuild the system database.

       rpmdb --parkdb
           Park the system database prior to inclusion on read-only
           media.

       rpmdb --verifydb --root /mnt
           Verify the system database of a system image mounted at /mnt.

       rpmdb --exportdb > /tmp/headers
           Export the system database to /tmp/headers file.

       rpmdb --importdb --define "_db_backend ndb" --dbpath /tmp/newdb <
       /tmp/headers
           Import contents of /tmp/headers header list to a (new) ndb-
           format database in /tmp/newdb.

OPTIONS         top

       See rpm-common(8) for the options common to all operations.

SEE ALSO         top

       popt(3), rpm(8), rpm-common(8)

       rpmdb --help - as rpm(8) supports customizing the options via popt
       aliases it's impossible to guarantee that what's described in the
       manual matches what's available.

       http://www.rpm.org/

COLOPHON         top

       This page is part of the rpm (RPM Package Manager) project.
       Information about the project can be found at 
       ⟨https://github.com/rpm-software-management/rpm⟩.  It is not known
       how to report bugs for this man page; if you know, please send a
       mail to man-pages@man7.org.  This page was obtained from the
       project's upstream Git repository
       ⟨https://github.com/rpm-software-management/rpm.git⟩ on
       2026-08-04.  (At that time, the date of the most recent commit
       that was found in the repository was 2026-07-27.)  If you discover
       any rendering problems in this HTML version of the page, or you
       believe there is a better or more up-to-date source for the page,
       or you have corrections or improvements to the information in this
       COLOPHON (which is not part of the original manual page), send a
       mail to man-pages@man7.org

RPM 6.1.90                      2026-08-03                       RPMDB(8)

Pages that refer to this page: yum-ovl(1),  rpm(8),  rpm-common(8)

HTML rendering created 2026-09-09 by Michael Kerrisk, author of The Linux Programming Interface.

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