Ever want to install software and find out your missing libraries? So you go and install all the libraries and dependencies. Then afterwards you decide you don’t want the software after all. You’ve installed megabytes worth of packages and dependencies. You want to get back to your previous state, but are not quite sure what needs to be removed. Now what do you do? You can’t remember what was installed or all the dependencies that came with those packages, but you roughly remember the day and time you played around with the new software.
This is where yum history comes to the rescue. (If you’re using a RPM friendly flavor of Linux, like Fedora or RedHat). You can get a history of what was installed by using
$> sudo yum history Loaded plugins: presto, refresh-packagekit ID | Login user | Date and time | Action(s) | Altered --------------------------------------------------------------- 47 | System <unset> | 2010-07-08 11:54 | Update | 11 46 | <nicholas> | 2010-07-07 22:53 | Update | 2 45 | <nicholas> | 2010-07-07 22:50 | Install | 49 44 | <nicholas> | 2010-07-03 18:52 | Install | 8 ...more
You can then find out what was installed that day and remove it:
$> sudo yum history undo 45
