Downloaded nolapro.tgz; having trouble opening program; can't find thread/FAQ for it

I have downloaded nolapro.tgz (the basic downloadable version, not the web based version). I have been reading all day for most direct way to begin using the program.

I read your directions and have looked for and searched forums/FAQs to no avail. Am I simply approaching this the wrong way (i.e. wrong search words/phrases) or did I miss something?

I am a newbie (1st post) so please be kind and use layman's English.
Thanks,
Scoutmaster

The .tgz on the end would typically indicate it is a gzip'ped tar file.

You should be able to see a list of files in the bundle by typing:
tar tvzf nolapro.tgz

You should be able to extract the files by typing:
tar xvzf nolapro.tgz

I'm not familiar with nolapro but typically this kind of bundle will contain a README file. You can read that to get further directions on what to do. Often such bundles are "source" bundles and you're expected to do steps like:
configure
make
make install
But it really depends on what the README says.

Originally Posted by Scoutmaster I have downloaded nolapro.tgz (the basic downloadable version, not the web based version). I have been reading all day for most direct way to begin using the program. I read your directions and have looked for and searched forums/FAQs to no avail. Am I simply approaching this the wrong way (i.e. wrong search words/phrases) or did I miss something? I am a newbie (1st post) so please be kind and use layman's English. Thanks, Scoutmaster

Well typically a tgz is a compressed tarball. To extract it you would use the commands:

gzip -d nolapro.tgz
tar xf nolapro.tar

or

tar xfz nolapro.tgz

It's possible you don't have tar or gunzip on your system and that would prevent you from extracting it however, baring that it should work fine.

Welcome to Linux Questions!

The ' tar ' flags changed five years ago ...

From /usr/doc/tar-1.15.1/NEWS , slack 10.2

version 1.15 - Sergey Poznyakoff, 2004-12-20 * Compressed archives are recognised automatically, it is no longer necessary to specify -Z, -z, or -j options to read them. Thus, you can now run `tar tf archive.tar.gz'.

So now you can just do :
'tar xvf <archive>' with tar.gz, tgz and tar.bz2 packages.

No more jxvf or zxvf is required . !
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The GUI applications for compressed files can be :
' ark ' ( kde 3 ), ' file-roller ' ( gnome ).
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