Can someone give me a basic overview on compling / installing apps? I hav tried unsuccessfuly to add a screensaver and openoffice

I get the idea (I think) - RPMs are for Redhat only?

Others use are complied using a script or the make command and then moved or copied to a location manually or using a script?

Thanks

For OpenOffice, it would be better if you installed from the rpms instead of the .src.rpm's.

If you have a source rpm, after installing it and CD'ing to the SPECS directory, you can run "sudo rpmbuild -bi <name>.spec" to compile and install from a source rpm.

Ideally, use your package manager.

If not, download the source tarball. Untar and unzip it (the man page will tell you how to do this - usually "tar -xvzf filename") and then see what it has in the way of "README" files.

Usually, it's as simple as (as your normal user):
./configure
make

And then (as root)
make install

If it's not that simple, there should be either a README or a guide online to tell you what to do.

The above does presuppose that you have GCC and the requisite libraries and so on installed, of course..

I don't know what a package manager is? I thought only Redhat had that?

How can I tell?

So for sources (not packages) then untar it then
configure
make

and then

make install

will all be called install? I guess if not as you say check the docs

I might try a screensaver now!

Virtually every distro has a package manager - even LFS can have one if you really want. They just don't all use RPMs.

If you'd filled in your profile with what distro you use (hint hint) we'd be able to tell you exactly what package manager you had available and how to use it to install things.

Don't forget the all-important "dot slash" in front of the "configure" step - if you don't put "./configure" it won't work.

I had focused on the OP's mention of RPM and didn't check the disto in the profile.
If the distro uses source packages (.tgz) for installation, using your distro's package system and downloading the package meant for your distro will lead to the fewest problems. I'm sure the distro comes with documentation which includes instructions for installing software.

ok thanks guys - have filled in my distro now..

But I thought I would be brave armed with my new found knowledge and try and compile from src..

So I choose a screensaver bundle called Really Slick Screensavers...

So I tried to untar but failed cos not in gzip format - Konqueror could open so I cut and paste out using that..

Then changed to the dir and did the ./configure command and that look like it did something - lots of ..yes but a final error

configure: error: cannot run /bin/sh ./config.sub

and then the make and the make install commands didn't work

Dam I'm George McThickie at the moment

ok tired about 20 more diff and mange to get one to compile and make

great thanks

during my travels I encountered a Slax? cmd called pkginstall - can someone explain what this is used for?

pkginstall installs packages in Slack's native format, which is .tgz

The tool is installpkg [small but important correction]

Basicly if you want least of worries I would suggest going with Debian or Debian-like systems as they have the best package manager out there. Every user has their opinions but apt-get that Debian's use is one of the greatest package managers in Linux world. I personally don't like RPM-based distros.... and yet I write this on RHEL5

So I guess it is just a script that unzips (sorry untars) then ./configure's and then make's and then make install's?

Can someone explain what ./configure does? I think make compiles and make install, compiles and executes the installer?

Thanks

installpkg doesn't compile them - the packages are already compiled, it just puts the files in the right places.

./configure generally checks that you've got all the vital things, checks which of the optional things you've got, and generates the relevant "make" file

make generally does the all the compiling

make install generally just moves the compiled files to the right places - which is why you need to be root to use it most of the time, as it moves them to system folders

perfect - I understand know - thanks for all your help - have cut and paste into a little text file