Hi all,
Here is the background to my story, its been a long few days i can tell you...

I am trying to learn OpenGL for a project i am working on, and i have bought this book, "Linux 3D Graphics Programming". It comes with a CD with Debian 2.2 on it and some sample programs etc.

The things on the CD that the book tells me i need on my linux installation are:

glib-1.2.8
gtk+-1.2.8
libsigc++-1.0.1
gtkmm-1.2.1
rplay-3.2.0b5

yup, these are all pretty old versions cos the book came out in 2001. i tried installing these on my laptop installation of RedHat Enterprise Workstation, but they would have dependences or somethin stupid. And im guessing because these libraries weren't installed properly, the programs wouldnt compile

so i gave up on the laptop, and tried installing the Debian onto a clean machine, so i could do it all in the environment the author intended. well to cut a long story short, after all the hassle's of the debian installer interface, it wouldn't install for some unknown reason. So now i've installed a fresh copy of RHES (not newest version (V3 U5)). I downloaded all of the newest versions of the above packages. glib-2.8.6 installed without a problem. then when i go to install gtk+-2.8.9 it comes up with this error in the ./configure stage:


now i dont really understand how libraries work in linux. Where they install, how they are recognised by other programs/installers... i just dont know. so since i have installed a newer version of glib than requested in the error, how come it has not recognised that?

so any help from anyone would be very much appreciated. I've been tearing my hair out over multiple problems with this. all i want is to be able to learn OpenGL and compile things without a problem. *sigh*

thanks in advance

So now i've installed a fresh copy of RHES (not newest version (V3 U5)). I downloaded all of the newest versions of the above packages. glib-2.8.6 installed without a problem. then when i go to install gtk+-2.8.9 it comes up with this error in the ./configure stage:
For any RHEL or RH-alike systems I would suggest not compiling from scratch (especially base libs like Glibc and GTK) unless the packages are not in any RH mirror or other repo. If you compile I'd suggest always turning it into an rpm and installing that. Keeps the system a wee bit more manageable.


configure: error: Package requirements (glib-2.0 >= 2.7.1 atk >= 1.0.1 pango >= 1.9.0 cairo >= 0.9.2) were not met.
OK. You should be able to find Atk and Pango as rpm's. DAG has an rpm for Cairo but that's 0.2.0-1.1. Looking at the spec (http://dag.wieers.com/packages/cairo/) it doesnt show any "difficult stuff" so you should have no problem using it to build an rpm with using the tarball. You'll find you need freetype-devel, fontconfig-devel, libpixman-devel, XFree86-devel and libpng-devel though which should all be available as rpm.


now i dont really understand how libraries work in linux. Where they install, how they are recognised by other programs/installers...
In general libraries are installed in the /lib, usr/lib and /usr/local/lib trees. You can install libraries outside of the trusted paths (ldconfig -p) but then you'll have to point to it using the LD_LIBRARY_PATH env var or use a preload (/etc/ld.so.preload). Applications "contain" a "list" (ldd /path/to/binary) of what libraries they need. Before executing the app the linker (/lib/ld*.so) uses the cache (/etc/ld.so.cache) and looks in the trusted paths for the libraries.


so since i have installed a newer version of glib than requested in the error, how come it has not recognised that?
Weird. What path was it installed into? Anyway. Go for rpms or compile to rpm. Using rpm the right way, letting it resolve dependencies all by itself, saves time and frustration. Frustration leads to anger and anger leads to ahhh, well, y'know.

glib2 and gtk2 are designed to coexist with glib1 gtk1
lots of programs or people still use gtk1 on new systems
should be rpms


what wont work is multiple versions of glib2 gtk2
don't even try to go there

hi thanks for the replies. I'll have a look into turning them into RPMs. Any tips from you guys in the meantime?

thanks for explaining the libraries thing for me. and yes, this really has led me to frustration and AGHGHHHHHHH!! really put me off linux, but lets see if it pulls me back.

i'll be back with my progress.

well i tried downloading the gtk+ as an RPM, the newest i could find was 2.6.1-2, but it has dependences as well... SIGH:


warning: gtk+-2.6.1-2.i386.rpm: V3 DSA signature: NOKEY, key ID e01260f1
error: Failed dependencies:
iconv is needed by gtk+-2.6.1-2
libXinerama.so.1 is needed by gtk+-2.6.1-2
xcursor is needed by gtk+-2.6.1-2
xft is needed by gtk+-2.6.1-2
xrender is needed by gtk+-2.6.1-2

i just tried installing iconv (libiconv-1.9.1) but it still shows up as missing in the rpm error. should i have to update something to make it show up? or is it just meant to be found?

for libiconv i followed the README installation instructions and used this command: ./configure --prefix=/usr/local

should i be pointing that rpm to this or something?

thanks

I think it's weird rpm doesn't pick up the dependencies automagically. What do you use to install rpm's? Apt-get, Yum, Synaptic, Autoupdate? If the libiconv tarball contains a .spec file (in the root or contrib dir) you can build a rpm right away: "rpm -tb libiconv-version.tar.gz".