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Thanks muchly Demonbane. You've explained this in a way that I can unnerstand it (i think). So my next question is, is it possible to have two versions of Z on my sys at the same time? Can I have two versions of Y on my system at the same time?
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It depends, some libraries permit multiple versions installed, some don't,and it usually needs to have a different major version number. So for example you can probably have both Y version 1.0 and 2.0 installed but not 2.0 and 2.01.
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That is, I'd have the (pre)existing Z, then I might compile Z fresh against the new Y (somehow?). If the compiled Z worked fine, then I could delete the original and the old Y. THEN I could go ahead and install X, no prob.
Is that possible to do? Is it super unadvisable to do (something akin to logging in as root by default)?
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What I'll do is I'll install the new version of Y (getting rid of the old version), recompile Z and install X. In almost all cases if a package compiles without complaining then it'll work as expected. IMO logging in as root on a desktop system is ok, you just have to be extra careful and bear the weight of other ppl calling you stupid. Think about it, which one is more likely to happen, someone accidentlly typed "rm -rf /" as root, or harddisk failures? If you don't have backups of your precious data then you deserve it, and if you're going to join #l33t-w4r3z while logged in as root again you deserve it.
But anyway If you're concerned about package management/dependency tracking, I recommend giving Gentoo a shot, you won't be disappointed.
), that have the convenience of binary apps (and good package management), but also have simple tools available to handle/track things on those occasions where doin it from source is the way to go.
