A .tar.gz (commonly known as a tarball) is commonly a source distribution. This means that you may need to follow these steps:
Code:
tar xzvf <name>.tar.gz
cd <name>
./configure
make
make install
However, there is no rule that says this *must* be the process, so once you've extracted the tarball and changed into the resulting directory, look for a file called README, INSTALL or something similar. This file will normally provide you with the exact instructions for this piece of software
Note: software distributed via tarball will NOT usually show up in your package manager
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