diff --git a/make-client-tarball b/make-client-tarball
index c38eb6e..a7a08e5 100755
--- a/make-client-tarball
+++ b/make-client-tarball
@@ -9,7 +9,7 @@ elif test -x /usr/libexec/platform-python; then
     python=/usr/libexec/platform-python
 else
     echo >&2 "Can't find Python"
-    exit 255
+    exit 127
 fi
 
 exec "$python" "$(dirname "$0")/make_client_tarball.py" "$@"
diff --git a/yumconf.py b/yumconf.py
old mode 100755
new mode 100644
index 89c42cb..8f5e7d6
--- a/yumconf.py
+++ b/yumconf.py
@@ -106,8 +106,8 @@ def yum_clean(self):
             subprocess.call(["yum", "clean", "all"] + args, stdout=fnull)
 
     def _get_yum_major_version(self):
-        proc = subprocess.Popen("yum --version | head -n1", shell=True, stdout=subprocess.PIPE)
-        output = to_str(proc.communicate()[0]).strip()
+        proc = subprocess.Popen(["yum", "--version"], stdout=subprocess.PIPE)
+        output = to_str(proc.communicate()[0]).strip().splitlines()[0]
         version = output.split(".")
         try:
             return int(version[0])
@@ -125,13 +125,16 @@ def repoquery(self, *args):
         cmd.extend(self.repo_args)
         cmd.extend(args)
         proc = subprocess.Popen(cmd, stdout=subprocess.PIPE)
-        output = to_str(proc.communicate()[0])
+        output = to_str(proc.communicate()[0]).splitlines()[0]
         retcode = proc.returncode
 
         if not retcode:
             return output
         else:
-            raise subprocess.CalledProcessError("repoquery failed")
+            raise subprocess.CalledProcessError(retcode,
+                                                cmd,
+                                                output,
+                                                "")
 
 
     def install(self, installroot, packages):