I have download a apache file apache_1.3.41.tar.gz , and copy it to /tmp , then compile it ( configure , make , make install ) , I have complete successfully to compile it , then it will automatically copy the apache program to /usr/sbin and/or some other directories , I use it well .

I would like to ask can I remove the directory /tmp/apache_1.3.41now , is this directory still useful ? thx

In principle, you can delete it.

I keep my sources for a while, just in case - I've got a directory for sources only in my home dir which I clean up from time to time.

If you are running out of disk space delete it. Or keep it. Either way, it would not affect your work.

In any event, if you leave it in /tmp it will be gone the next time you reboot.
cheers,
jdk

You may want to consider adding an extra step. When you use make install to install something to the system the only easy way to remove it is by the uninstall script (if the dev built one) in the source. So if you delete the source, you delete the uninstall script. If you go ahead and build the rpm(assuming rpm based distro) and install via the package manager, removal is then a trivial task. With common apps (like apache) you can grab the spec file from the source rpm, change whatever options in the spec file to reflect your needs(same as compile options), and rebuild the rpm. For less common apps(no src rpm available) it can be a little more work.

You may want to consider adding an extra step. When you use make install to install something to the system the only easy way to remove it is by the uninstall script (if the dev built one) in the source. So if you delete the source, you delete the uninstall script. If you go ahead and build the rpm(assuming rpm based distro) and install via the package manager, removal is then a trivial task. With common apps (like apache) you can grab the spec file from the source rpm, change whatever options in the spec file to reflect your needs(same as compile options), and rebuild the rpm. For less common apps(no src rpm available) it can be a little more work.

Really? I knew that inside of /tmp there are caches and temporary files, and just caches and temporary files will be gone once reboot PC, sincerely I do not know how it works, but I'm sure that in my slack it doesn't exist, I've got old files saved there, and the terminal doesn't give any error about it. Let me know, bye.