Metagen/megagen.sh

[Peter Schober]

* Ernie Kinsey <Ernie.Kinsey at cpcc.edu> [2018-02-09 15:35]:
> I spoke to one of these folks yesterday and he mentioned RPM, which
> is good because otherwise I’d just be replying to ask you what “RPM”
> meant before giving you what info I had about metagen.sh.

:)

RPM: Precompiled packaged binaries for the software plus configuration
files plus scripts for updates and migrations pre/post installation
and service restarts.
Much like .deb for Debian/Ubuntu, if that helps.

There's an official YUM repository (in case you're running out of
terminology to ask the enterprise server folks about; like apt for
Debian/Ubuntu) you should be using for the Shib SP software on CentOS
and RedHat Enterprise Linux.

> we use a mix of Ubuntu and Debian.

If your servers are running Debian personally I'd certainly not run
change to CentOS only because of the SP. (YMMV, of course.)
The Debian packaging team keeps the "backports" (another term to ask
the server foks about) repositories pretty much up-to-date with the
releases from the Shibboleth project. So Debian usually is in very
good shape and has current software (with fixes applied) -- thanks to
volunteer efforts from Russ, Feri and Etienne (and Scott)!

For Ubuntu it depends when in their respective release cycles they
forked their stuff from Debian, AFAIU, and there are no PPAs (yet
another aconym to check out!) with current, properly maintained
Shibboleth software I know about.
(SWITCHaai provides third-party Shib SP packages for Ubuntu to their
community but they don't support their use outside of their community.)

HTH,
-peter