Not all packages work well as relocatable packages. Some packages have files that simply must go into a certain location and are therefore not relocatable. Some packages have programs that are hard-coded to look for files in a particular location and therefore cannot be relocated elsewhere. Other packages have symbolic links that also may not be relocatable. Furthermore, your package may provide software that is referenced by other packages, in the known directories. Relocating such a package will disable other software packages, packages you may not even know about.

If your packages face any of these problems, chances are that making the package relocatable is not a good idea.

In addition, if you use the %doc directive with local file names, remember that RPM will make a package-specific documentation directory, normally under /usr/doc. For example:

%doc README NEWS

This may defeat your attempts to create a relocatable package, unless you have a Prefix: directive with /usr, because the normal location is under /usr/doc, and all files in the %files section must start with one of the directories named with Prefix: directives.