Tar Balls
 

Hello, I have been looking all over the internet for just one article that actually tells one how to install programs from tar balls. Not a single one starts from the beginning, as in for someone that cannot read the mind of the writer and know all of the assumed things that someone should know. I would like to know how to install things like OpenOffice, Macromedia player and drivers for my video card. Can someone please help me? Yes, I need to be hand fed and walked, and talked to slowly. I paid 50 bucks for a bigass book on FC3 and out of the 600 some odd pages it has 1 1/2 pages dedicated to explaining how to "Compile from source code" and of course it assumes that I know how to do about a dozen things that I do not know how to do. I am sorry for the rant, but I am at my wits end, 6 billion webpages and not one that actually can tell me HOW to install from a tarball. And if it is that hard, how do people get programs on their computers?

to untar a program:
if its a tar.gz or tgz in some cases use:
tar -xvzf <filenam.tar.gz>.
This will uncompress the tar ball in the current directory
for a tar.bz2 use:
tar -xvjf <filenam.tar.bz2>

Openoffice has an installer, all you need to do is to triger the installer. read the pdf that comes with the program. Anyway every program has a README or INSTALL file with instructions.
To compile something from source, there is a tutorial in the tutorial section of LQ:
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...ticle&artid=15

Be carefull, if you did a default FC 3 instalation the development packages may be missing and if this is the case, you won't be able to compile something until u install them. Look your menu for a add/remove utility, to install the development packages from the CD's

instead of whining, it would be more efficient if you just listed the exact steps you have taken, or commands you tried, and the error messages you received :)

for starters, what are the dozen things that the book assumes you know how to do?

not sure about the 6 billion pages, but here's a tutorial that came up on the first page of a google search:

http://www.linuxforums.org/tutorials...ial-19957.html

people here are happy to help, but you'll get better results if you set things out specifically and clearly....

:cool:

ouch

Genesee
I understand the feeling that sharkscott is explaining and when you are new, it seems undaunting

what the *** is a tarball? is the first question a newbie feels (i am still a newbie)

sometimes a quick point in the right direction helps

one thing i noticed is that sometimes its xfvz or xvfz or -xfvz or -xvfz or some combination

why? i dont know, but i have tried it on a few of my tarballs and i had to use different variations for it to begin

can you imagine running across this for the very first time, you come a forum and someone accuses you of whining?

i stuck thru it, and it was quite an experience

some others may need a little nudge

sharkscott

my advice

go to the unofficial fedora site, change your yum.conf EXACTLY as he states and follow all of the applicable application instructions

it worked for me, after reinstalling fedora for like the 12th time, the unofficial site was a breeze and i wish someone had pointed me in that direction as soon as i came to the forums

:) ok.... but instead of "it doesn't work, it's hard!" - it would be better to say "I read X and Y, and I don't understand what they mean by Z" - just general observations that Linux terminolgy is confusing aren't going to solve the problem.

as to tar, you don't need the "-" before the options, and the order of options shouldn't matter -- so "tar xvzf <file>" should be the same as "tar fzvx <file>" - what each mean is in the man page for tar, type "man tar" in a console/terminal for a full description, arrow keys to scroll, and "q" to exit.

I assume that would be www.fedorafaq.org.
I agree, by the way - it can be tricky at first. I recommend the article at
www.geocities.com/tipsforlinux/articles/27.html.

"Installing or Upgrading Without RPM"
http://www.tldp.org/LDP/lame/LAME/li...-tarballs.html

The man page will give you a place to start: tar
http://www.linuxcommand.org/man_pages/tar1.html


What is a "Compiler" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compiler

"Tar (file format)"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tar_%28file_format%29

It is always good know to what the words mean and not just how to follow steps. The tutorial on this site under Linux Tutorials is one of the best available.


Two of the best places to Search are Google Search:Linux http://www.google.com/linux
and "Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

Genesee

I wish i could video each time it happened
maybe you are right, but for the life of me, i remember untarring quite a few, and thats what i had to do

when i first started, i had a notebook and wrote down the commands, and one in particular, i tried every variation of xvzf and only one worked

i didnt know you didnt need the "-", but even then, sometimes they worked and sometimes not

i am still computer illiterate and i come here and you guys make me feel like i am in kindergarten, but i do appreciate all of the help here, whether directly answering a question or just finding it out thru reading the threads

but coming from windows and following directions and doing searches, and this doesnt work and that doesnt work, you do get very frustrated and your question usually does come out as a big long whiiiiine

hey, but its all good

Thank You
 

Hello all,
Thank You for all of the information you all gave me. I have been working all weekend and I have not had a chance to work on this until now. I am going to get this figured out, thanks to your help. If I have more questions I will post them here or if this thread gets closed I will start another with reference to this one.

Again, Thank You for taking the time to help me.

Scott:)

Okay. To revive and old thread and theme which appears here often but with a slightly different twist, here's my dilemma.

I don't seem to have the "TAR" utility on a dedicated server that we rent.

The company decided they had to wipe our system for no particular reason. I packed some important client/domain account info using something like this:

tar c dir | bzip2 > dir.tar.bz2

This produced a myfiles.tar.bz2 file which I downloaded and saved to restore later. I unzipped this using:

bunzip2 -vv myfiles.tar.bz2 | tar

This is producing just myfiles.tar. In checking and trying to use a command like "tar xvf myfiles.tar" I receive a "No Such Commad" error. And if I try to locate it with "find -name *tar* -print" the only thing found are a few tar'd archives, but no such program/utility or command.

How do I unpack these if the TAR command is invalid? Could my Linux installation as provided by the host be lacing the utility? If so where/how do I install it to unpack these? (The archives are fine and valid I can open them in Windows with WinRAR but doing so and uploading them,some in the range of 1GB in size would defeat the purpose of compressing them in the first place)

Sorry if this was too long a post! LOL.

-Tom (aka XR)

So you write to the provider of the service and demand tar ;) Of course it should be there for heavens sake.