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I'm new to Linux and I'm trying to install software. My Mandrake documentation only talks about installing software via the RPM utility using .rpm files. Everything I go to download however is in tar.gz format or similar. I don't know what do do with these files. Can anyone explain?
tar.gz files are tar'ed and ziped files. Usually these contain the source code for the program. What you do with them is extract them and read the INSTALL or README (or both) file(s) contained within.
tar -xzvf <filename.tar.gz>
tar -xjvf <filename.tar.bz2>
You may find files in sourcecode which are most often tar.gz
Easier way of installing maybe the .rpm (and easier uninstall, too)
RPM means RedHatPacket Manager files ..(which will most often be made for some different distributions ..)
I think Mandrake has often .mdk files which then possibly the best to use (if they exist)
You may want to check out this article by jeremy. It really helped me out when I got started. Once I got the hang of it, I prefer to compile rather than use an RPM.Compiling from Source
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