I don't know how to do it and it's one of the most important Linux things as far as usability goes. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE help and make sure it's EASY lol. I googled but found no all encompassing tutorial for Fedora and figured you guys knew better.

The best answer to your question is, there is no answer ^^. Seriously though, most of the programs distributed as source should come with a FAQ telling you how to build it. If it does not, then most likely it is not worthy installing, IMHO.

Some peoples will tell you that the "standard" way to compile programs is by using the commands "./configure, make and make install". I disagree. While it will build most of the programs that way, sometimes you need to add additional flags to the compiler, for example: Building Apache with mysql support or mplayer with GUI support.

Check this link:

http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ad.php?t=45094

it's a sticky telling how to install programs in Linux. My last advice is: You will almost never gain any speed performance when compiling programs from source. Except maybe for mplayer, all other programs run at the same speed in my experience. Your Fedora distribution has a great tool for installing binaries (YUM) and you should really stick with it. This "compiling everything" mentality is very strong in the Linux community and I don't know exactly why ^^.

Good luck!

This particular program has no RPM and it's necessary that I install it. When I try to do the make install and stuff like it says nothing happens and it says no file can be found or w/e.

It would be easier if you told us the program and posted up the output/error messages you get when you try to compile.

Normally you do:
When you untar the package, look for an INSTALL or README file, it will often tell you the best way to install the source package.

I am trying to install this:

ftp://ftp.penguin.cz/pub/users/mhi/vxfs/

The most recent vxtools.

Any help = greatly appreciated.

Okay I cd to the directory I installed in and do ./configure and get this error:

"creating cache ./config.cache
Package: vxtools-0.4
checking for gcc... no
checking for cc... no
configure: error: no acceptable cc found in $PATH"

Then if I try and continue anyway using make I get this:

"make: *** No targets specified and no makefile found. Stop."

Please help.

Okay I found out it's cuz I had no C compiler and now it working on the ./configure front but make and make install gives me another problem:

[root@xx-xx-xxx-xx vxtools-0.4]# make
gcc -M -I. *.c > .depend
gcc -g -O2 -I. -c -o vxls.o vxls.c
gcc -g -O2 -I. -c -o super.o super.c
gcc -g -O2 -I. -c -o olt.o olt.c
olt.c: In function ‘vx_readolt’:
olt.c:65: warning: cast from pointer to integer of different size
olt.c:65: error: invalid lvalue in assignment
make: *** [olt.o] Error 1
[root@xx-xx-xxx-xx vxtools-0.4]# make install
gcc -g -O2 -I. -c -o olt.o olt.c
olt.c: In function ‘vx_readolt’:
olt.c:65: warning: cast from pointer to integer of different size
olt.c:65: error: invalid lvalue in assignment
make: *** [olt.o] Error 1

Bump.

Please help.