i dont understand slackwares package management system, is it based on source install or is it something special?

could someone direct me to a tutorial that tells how to use it and what it does?

man pkgtool
oh and http://www.swaret.org
you have to get swaret if you use slackware it makes updates easy, and works (so far) without many glitches.

It comes down to this:
*.tgz files are slackware packages, which basically contain the binaries compiled for slackware. Which makes it very pure .. you can just extract those files to see what's in the tgz file.

source is another kind of "package", though I wouldn't call it package management. I use checkinstall when I compile from source, so I create a slackware package and install that one (easier to remove later on). That's not a necessary thing to do, but it makes life easier sometimes

would you mind explaining this? whats checkinstall?

checkinstall is a utility that you use to create a slackware package ...
so your source compilation goes like this (generic)
./configure
make
make install

and with checkinstall you would do
./configure
make
checkinstall

you will be prompted for several options, and then checkinstall will create a slackware package(tgz) and install that package.

With source code, to uninstall, you need to count on a "make uninstall" rule in the makefile
With checkinstall however, you do removepkg whatever the title of your package.

and yes, if you want to get rid of a program, removepkg program is easier than searching for all the files you can remove... so in that way it makes life easier

even better would be to see for yourself
http://asic-linux.com.mx/~izto/checkinstall/index.php

if u spend a little bit time at http://www.slackware.com/book/index....rce=c3984.html I'm sure u'll understand slack's pkgtool ....

have fun