Used yum to install a program with a version of 2.4.2

The on another system did apt-get install the same program, difference is it has installed version 2.3.6, as such it's missing some of the sparkly bits I'd like.

So... my question is, where do I go from here? I'm guessing I download the correct package, and manually install it. Finding instructions for that isn't a problem...

But what do I do about the fact I have a previous version installed? Should I install it? Or is there a way to use yum / apt-get for an update from a manual install?

Sorry, probably a very newbie question - but my google searches haven't really helped me out. Probably because it's so basic.

I take it you are using two different distributions between the two systems. I believe both of them (yum and apt-get) support update, so yum update does a full update on everything and apt-get update gets similar results. However unless configured else wise, these will only go to the distributions latest stable releases. The fact there isn't a 2.4.2 on I am guessing either ubuntu or debian is that it may not be considered stable as yet for the distributions repositories.

Sorry, possibly not being very clear. I'll give all the detail below - but it's more generic what I'm asking than this particular program, trying to understand things more.

Yes, I'm using a Fedora system and an Ubuntu system. The program I've installed and got running on both is smokeping. Thing is with Fedora 10 yum install smokeping, installs the 2.4.2 version.

When I then put this on my Ubuntu system (version 9 sommat) with "apt-get install smokeping" the version it installs is 2.3.6. Yes, I've tried an "apt-get update"

Now my question is how do I go about upgrading 2.3.6 to 2.4.2? I'm not after the smokeping specific way of doing this, I'd like to be able to do this for any program.

In my mangled understanding of Linux, the version of anything I download is held in the repository for that distro? If I want a higher and possibly not fully tested version do I have to install that manually? If so what do I do with the older version - should I delete it? Something I read kinda indicated dependency's can get messed up this way, and the way they said it made me think that was a bad thing, like breaking a registry is windows.

Very newbie questions... it's the first time a program version issue like this has come up for me, and the first time yum or apt-get hasn't just done it all for me, and I'm struggling to understand how to proceed.

Any help much appreciated.

Hi

When you install some distro, it does not change any version numbers until you upgrade. So if for example you have Ubuntu 9.04, you will stay at the same versions, until you upgrade to 9.10.

There are some exceptions. Since this is a common problem, Ubuntu (and many other distros) have a system for "backports". It means they make packages available for new versions of software on older distros.

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/UbuntuBackports

But I checked smokeping, and it doesn't seem to be upgraded for quite some time, and there was no backport for it. So then I think your only option will be to download and install it manually.

Takk Guttorm, definitely helps me understand what is going on more =) First time I've come across Backports, and that link explains them well. Much appreciated.

Again, in total newbie style, what things do I have to be concerned about when manually installing something? Happy to follow a manual on how to install an application. But what do I do about the previous version? They don't mention that =P

Is it best to install the old version first?
Should I worry about any dependency's when doing this manually?

Sorry have been rather spoilt with the yum and apt-get, so doing this manually I'm a little unsure over.

Hi

In general, installing the old version first, can help a bit. Usually a program needs a lot of other programs, and when you install the old version, you get all those dependencies installed. But of course, the new version can have new features with new dependencies...

So you need to read some documentation. I found this link:

http://oss.oetiker.ch/smokeping/doc/...nstall.en.html

There are quite a lot of dependencies, but most of them are optional.

If you install something in /usr/local it will "override" things in /usr. For example, if there is a smokeping program in both /usr/local/bin and in /usr/bin, the /usr/local/bin is the one being used.

On Debian/Ubuntu systems, there are packages that can be of great help when you do a manual installs:
- build-essential
It provides compiler, linker and stuff so you can compile programs.
- apt-file
When your new version fails, it will usually output some error message about some file missing. With apt-file you can search for packages that installs those files. For example, you get an error message that it can't find some file "/usr/lib/whatever.so". Then run the command "apt-file search /usr/lib/whatever.so" and it will hopefully list a package you can install.

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