help installing missing libraries/packages
 

I'm a newbie, and i just installed the slackware 11.
I have a (stupid ?) question!
How can i install missing libraries/packages from internet after slackware was installed and i want to add new program with missing dependecies?
Thanx in advance!
Zooley
:newbie:

Easy. Find out what packages contain the missing libs and install those packages.

You can google the lib name and usually find out what package provides it.

If you install a program that requires libraries that your system doesn't have, the program won't run. What program/package are you trying to install? If your building a program from source, normally there is either a README or INSTALL file that comes with the source that explains what dependicies are required. Some of these documents include URL's to locate dependicies and some explain how to check your system for required files/versions.

For Slackware 11, make use of one of the ftp mirrors. I've bookmarked this one in my browser, so I can easily get to it.
ftp://slackware.mirrors.tds.net/pub/...slackware-11.0

Basically, it's the same directory structure as on the DVD.

If you need anything that's not there somewhere, which you can determine by searching through FILELIST.TXT, you can usually find it at http://www.linuxpackages.net.

Most libraries I had to install were easy to setup. If you don't want to create a package yourself and can't find a precompiled one five simple steps are usually enough:

1) download tarball, extract it and cd to the extracted folder
2) ./configure --prefix=/usr <-- if there is something missing you should get an error
3) make <-- if configure did'nt give an error make surely will in case something is still missing
4) su <-- to intall the compiled files you have to be root
5) make install

If you want to create packages, so that you can later easily remove the files, check (a) checkinstall (it's on the Slackware CDs in /extra) and if you want to one step further (b) the documentation at www.linuxpackages.net and maybe Patrick Volkerding's work in the /source folder of your CDs on how to build Slackware packages with a buildscript.