Alright. I am new to linux, but very familiar with Windows. Lets say I want to install firefox:

I see tar/gz files as a zip/rar. I have to unrar the folder, open it up, and have the installer do the work.

With linux, I untar, CD into it, and make an install? But, why do you sometimes have to "make", then "make install" ?

Also, can I delete the original tar/gz file? What about the directory that I CD'ed into, or does it install into that directory?

And I suppose uninstalling an application isn't as easy as the add/remove program menu...?

Very noob, I know, but I need to start somewhere! Thanks, I hope.

Andrew

How you install can depend on what distribution you are using. If you install a program from source, you need to compile it into binary form. In that situation, you would do a "make" and "make install." After you install the program, you can remove the source files (i.e. the tar.gz file and the source directory). In some situations, you may want to keep the source directory in case you later want to uninstall the application. But not all applications have a "make uninstall," so YMMV.

Most distributions already have packages of software precompiled, which saves a lot of time and is easier to install. There are package managers for different distributions that make it easy to install and uninstall applications.

For Slackware, there is a graphical front-end for pkgtool called xpkgtool. You can get it here:

http://xpkgtool.sourceforge.net/

make and make install run different scripts as defined in a make file. 99.9% of the time, you just obediently type "./configure && make && make install" and watch things happen.

Quote:

Also, can I delete the original tar/gz file? What about the directory that I CD'ed into, or does it install into that directory?

If you want to, you can. I always keep the most recent versions, because disk space is cheap enough.

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And I suppose uninstalling an application isn't as easy as the add/remove program menu...?

Depends what distro you use. Most of them have graphical user interfaces to remove programs.

I may be misinterpreting what you wrote, but you seem to have the misconception that most programs are installed from source code. That's not the case if you go for an established distro - you can use pre-compiled _binary_ packages specific to your distribution. This is a good idea because it makes sure all the different programs work together fine. Incompatibilities between particular versions of software do happen, and this is why we need RedHat, Suse, and/or the Debian project - they resolve these issues before the software reaches the end user!

There are also general non-specific binary packages (usually these come in .tar.gz format again) that should work with the vast majority of distros. Most closed-source software for Linux is distributed in this way.

Regards,

Samsara

Hi,

I have a linux application which i think is quite old.. when i tried to run it.. it shows that it required C language library and stuff like tat.. all sort of error come out.. i type ./configure for it.. it comes out it need a /wish directory.. and use a make install as per instructed in the readme files.. all sort of error showing 'C language library coming out.. Could there been anyone kind hearted to help me? Thanks..