Satellite - Provide two different filtered versions of the same repository (eg EPEL) with the same activation key

Solution In Progress - Updated -

Issue

It is not possible in Satellite to generate a Content View with two different versions of the same repository.

This can be useful when you need to install custom packages on production servers from an external repository. One team can validate the use of theses packages in production environment, but at the same time it can be required to install additional packages from this same source for debugging purpose, or other purpose.

Let's take an example with atop and htop packages :

If IT service validated usage in production of atop and htop for administration, since Red Hat do not ship these packages it will be required to be installed from EPEL (Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux). You can find here additional information on how to use EPEL repository.. To avoid pushing whole EPEL repository on production server and limit installation of not tested RPMs, the repository should be filtered.
This filter will allow only atop and htop softwares and their dependencies not already available in RHEL repositories.
It still can be relevant to offer a way for local administrators to install manually some tools from EPEL for debugging purpose for example.
This is done by providing a non-filtered version of EPEL repository, which must be disabled by default to avoid installing RPMs accidentally.
With this setup, if an administrator needs to install an other RPM, he just have to disable the filtered repository then enable the non-filtered one and then install the packages.

Note : Installation of EPEL RPMs is not supported since this can cause unpredictable situations.

The issue is when trying to Publish a CCV having two CVs with same repos [obviously 1 with no filters and other with package filter] is the following :

You have selected more than one component Content View Version with the same repository resulting in slower publishing:
<...>
For the duplicate repositories, the packages in each Content View Version will combine regardless of the filters that were applied to the individual Content View Version.

Environment

  • Red Hat Satellite 6.x
  • One activation key / content view
  • One repository required to be filtered on some servers and full on others

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