Is Slackware like other Linux distributions and has a repository of precompiled binary packages that can be easily installed, or does everything have to be compiled from source?

If there are repositories where do I find them? I have just installed Slackware and was wondering. Thanks.

You can find precompiled Slackware packages around the net, but personally, I like building my source into my own package for greater control.

FYI: SLackware packages arn't really binaries, it's just a .tar.gz (renamed to .tgz to destinguish between a source tarball) of the source build directory and 2 helper files for a description and extra commands after install if needed.

Helpful sites:
Slackware Package HOWTO
official slackware package browser (look in extra under slack-current for special software )
http://www.google.com (the best resource for finding slackware packages)

regards,
...drkstr

New packages are available at slackware-current. Also you can find the most up to date applications at linuxpackages.net

Goto sites like Slacky.it, Develia.org, and LinuxPackages.net. You can use a program like Slapt-get to manage applicable repositories.

Yeah man, Slackware packages are indeed binaries. You can use the installation dialog pkgtool (as root) to install and remove stuff.

To stop the confusion - the Slackware packages you install on your computer, just like with Redhat, SuSE, Mandriva etc... are "binary packages", in the sense that they contain pre-compiled binaries (along with program documentation, post-installation script etcetera). Gentoo is the distro where you have to compile every single piece of software by hand if you want it on your system.

If you want to install any software that is not available as a Slackware package, it is absolutely common to grab the sources and compile/install them yourself. Some people/sites offer SlackBuild scripts, which are quite similar to Gentoo ebuilds or RPM spec files, in that they allow you to create a binary Slackware package from the sources without the need for you to exactly know how to compile the software (the SlackBuild script does all the hard work for you).

Eric

The package browser is out of date (and so are the changelogs on slackware.it/en) and seems to have been for quite some time.

I guess I misunderstood what a binary package was. I thought it refered to the package itself. For instance, you can browse though a .tgz package in KDE or extract it with a basic 'tar zxf' command, as apposed to a '.rpm' or '.deb'. Of course it's quite possible you can do these things with those types of packages as well, I just wasn't able to figure out how to do it with basic arch commands.

Yeah, I really just use it to find out what files are in what package if I ever get a "file not found" error. slackware.oregonstate.edu is a pretty up to date mirror for fast downloads.

regards,
...drkstr

Thanks for the info guys you've all been very helpful. I think I'll find myself visiting this forum quite a bit. Anyway I just have to get my head around the Slackware way of doing things. My only experience with Linux thus far has been with Kubuntu (Ubuntu) which had a very easy method for installing precompiled binary packages.

However I now want to have a greater understanding of what is going on under the hood so to speak and from what I've read it sounds like Slackware is the distro for that.