I recently downloaded a source copy of Gaim (tar.gz) from the official Gaim website, having found out that there are no binaries available for a slacker to use. All of the other packages are in rpm, the reason why I opted to download the source instead.

As of now, I have no idea how to install software from source. Will I compile it first? I don't even know how to do it.

Somehow I have managed to install firefox (tar.gz) but I dont think that it is source based. I just run a command from the terminal as said on the firefox website. Gaim website has no instructions on how to install the package, esp on slack.

I have also tried to download the autopackage (.package) version of Gaim, hoping that it will install. But when it checks for the spell checking library...

Checking for required C library versions ... OK
Checking for GTK+ user interface toolkit ... OK
Checking for Audio File Library ... OK
Checking for libao cross platform audio library ... OK
Checking for GtkSpell Spell Checking Library ... failed
-------------------------------
Error: Could not find 'GtkSpell Spell Checking Library'. Try using the native package manager for Slackware (pkgtool) to install a package with similar name to 'gtkspell'.

Error: Unable to prepare package Gaim Internet Messenger.

Hmmm...Im really curious about this stuff. I'm new to slack, and to the whole linuxland Can you guys help me get Gaim up?

Assuming you installed the development packages, you would untar the source, cd into the directory it is in, and run:

./configure
./make
./make install

Though instead of "make install" it would be a better idea to use checkinstall, which will create Slackware packages out of the newly compiled source.

It sounds like you might want to check out LinuxPackages.net, they host Slackware packages of popular software. You can find FireFox and Gaim there.

Whoa a lot of thanks to you guys. But just right after my post I have discovered that autopackage has already managed to install Gaim! I have found out right after I ran configure. It warned me that another version is in /usr/bin. Oh well. I guess I don't have the spellchecking feature, as said by the error.

A package for Gaim is right there on the Slackware install CD (in the "xap" package set).

Eric

Either that, or you get it via slapt-get:

# slapt-get --install gaim

Assuming you have the right package sources enabled

-A

How would I enable it then?