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Hello, this would be my first post here. Anyway I have installed Linux Redhat 9 and have become familiar with it, I have my GUI the way I like it. AMSN, Mozilla FireFox and XMMS installed. But I am still confused on many installation process's. I can download the zipped app. Let's Say test.51.tar.gz I use the command "gzip -d test.51.tar.gz" this would decompress it into a test.51.tar . I continue to "tar xvf test.51.tar". This then makes it a directory. From there I can get the readme or so called installation help. I get lost right there i have no idea where to continue. I have become lucky with my last installs. I need a clean guide or help to tell me where to go from that point. If any of you would be able to help me that would be great. I never want to go back to Windows again but if I can't install applications I have no choice. Thanks for listening to my rant. Cheers!
That will extract it to it's own directory (usually ... one that doesn't create it's own dir is Acrobat Reader). Just change to said directory and run:
Code:
./configure
make
su (then enter root password)
make install
That's all there is to it. To get a run down on all the switches for tar, run:
Code:
man tar
from a console.
I hope this helps a bit and welcome to LinuxQuestions.org
THATīs what I call a precious explanation in plain english. Why canīt the manuals of the distros do that? Itīs hidden somewhere between 1000 pages of hieroglyphes.
Thanks for the reply, I am wondering what does the tar -zxvf command do as opposed to my tar xvf command? my command decompresses the file into a directory. Once again thank your for your timley response.
The 'z' option allows tar to filter the file through gzip, therefore instead of unzip then untar, you use one tar command to do both.
You can also use 'j' for bzip2 archives, eg "tar xvjf somefile.tar.bz2"
I'd be interested to know: Why the "./" before "configure"? Why can't you just type in "configure"?
Linux is not like windows, it won't execute a program in the current directory if it's not in the path, and even if the current directory is in the path (represented by a . ) it also search the path in order so if a preceding directory has a program by the same name then it will be the one to be executed. The ./ ensure that the configure you use is the one in the present directory.
That one confuses a lot of new linux programmer (it confused me) when they write a program, call it test and wonder why it doesn't do anything. There's already a program called test in linux and it's usually in a directory that's at the beginning of the path, that's the one that get executed instead of the one the programmer wrote, that is until he tries ./test
The purpose of the make utility is to determine automatically which
pieces of a large program need to be recompiled, and issue the commands
to recompile them. The manual describes the GNU implementation of
make, which was written by Richard Stallman and Roland McGrath. Our
examples show C programs, since they are most common, but you can use
make with any programming language whose compiler can be run with a
shell command. In fact, make is not limited to programs. You can use
it to describe any task where some files must be updated automatically
from others whenever the others change.
To prepare to use make, you must write a file called the makefile that
describes the relationships among files in your program, and the states
the commands for updating each file. In a program, typically the exe-
cutable file is updated from object files, which are in turn made by
compiling source files.
Once a suitable makefile exists, each time you change some source
files, this simple shell command:
make
suffices to perform all necessary recompilations. The make program
uses the makefile data base and the last-modification times of the
files to decide which of the files need to be updated. For each of
those files, it issues the commands recorded in the data base.
make executes commands in the makefile to update one or more target
names, where name is typically a program. If no -f option is present,
make will look for the makefiles GNUmakefile, makefile, and Makefile,
in that order.
Normally you should call your makefile either makefile or Makefile.
(We recommend Makefile because it appears prominently near the begin-
ning of a directory listing, right near other important files such as
README.) The first name checked, GNUmakefile, is not recommended for
most makefiles. You should use this name if you have a makefile that
is specific to GNU make, and will not be understood by other versions
of make. If makefile is `-', the standard input is read.
make updates a target if it depends on prerequisite files that have
been modified since the target was last modified, or if the target does
not exist.
Ok, that may seem like a bit of "double dutch", but in essence, when make is run , it checks the makefile in the current directory, which is basically a set of rules on what is to be compiled for your particular distro/version etc. and usually tells you if you are missing a component or library required for the compile.
Make is an executable ala windows style:
Code:
-rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 132568 Jan 2 2003 make*
As you can see, root can read, write and execute make, all others can read and execute. the install after make, is simply an argument telling make to install the compiled program, and you need to run this as root because installing stuff into /usr/bin/ etc. requires root access.
I hope that explains it. If it doesn't, we're both in trouble
Why not download apt4rpm for Redhat 9 and use synaptic to manage the packages , its much easier!! Just google for apt4rpm and redhat , download the correct rpm install with rpm -ivh packagename , then su - to root and type apt-get update && apt-get install synaptic . you can also google for Repositories for your distro and add them to /etc/apt/sources save the file and update again to see what new packages are available
./configure
make
su (then enter root password)
make install
That's all there is to it. To get a run down on all the switches for tar, run:
Code:
man tar
from a console.
I am having a similar problem with knowing what to do after extraction. I followed your instruction in this post and it all worked until ./configure. I get bash: ./configure: no such file or directory
I am using OpenLinux 2.2.5 and the program in question is planets3d
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