On Sat, 9 Feb 2002, Ozgeek wrote:

I am a beginner and would be grateful for help in how to open and install files with tar.gz SuSE will open the files OK and show a lot of files. However there doesn't appear top be an installation file. How do I go about installing these type of programmes. Thanks for your help.

Ozgeek

Hello .tar.gz files are very much like .zip, so they naturally can contain source code to compile or binary files ready to run. In case the .tar.gz contains binary files, then you simply unpack them somewhere and run it - after reading README/INSTALL or whatever comes with it. Suse 7.3 comes with Konfigure, a KDE application, that should be able to automate configuration, compilation and installation of .tar.gz containing source code. If I were you I took a look at it. --Jyry C:-( C:-/ C========8-O C8-/ C:-(

Hi In general .. When you get a tar.gz file the following is normally the procedure ( normally ! ) 1) a .tar.gz file is a set of files that have been wrapped up into a bundle using the tar command. This tar file has then been compressed using the gunzip utility ( a bit like winzip ). So you need to unzip it, then untar it. You can do this by clicking on it on the desktop or more usually, open a shell, change to the directory where the file is type tar -zxvf yourfilename.tar.gz This usually creates a subdirectory with the files in. 2) Change to the new directory cd <your new dir> and look for files called README or INSTALL best to type mc for midnight commander, which lets you see a list of files and view them 3) Normally the process to build a set of files is along the following lines. ./configure // Configures the makefiles for your computer make // Builds the program make install // Copies the program to the correct directories the make install step often requires you to be the superuser(root ) so its necessary to type su then the root password before the last step 4. after make install, if you did "su", type exit, to go back to being your own login user. the program should now be installed, and may appear in a menu (kde,gnome etc ) or often you have to type its name. 5. Sometimes you need to tell the make process, where certain files are .. when you type ./configure you should really type first ./configure --help which will produce a long list of options Anyway, this should get you started, it probably seems very confusing to start with, and using rpm's is fine to begin with. Hope this helps dids On Saturday 09 February 2002 12:24 am, Ozgeek wrote:

I am a beginner and would be grateful for help in how to open and install files with tar.gz SuSE will open the files OK and show a lot of files. However there doesn't appear top be an installation file. How do I go about installing these type of programmes. Thanks for your help.

Ozgeek

Thanks, Dids. This is very helpful. Ozgeek dids wrote:

Hi

In general .. When you get a tar.gz file the following is normally the procedure ( normally ! )

1) a .tar.gz file is a set of files that have been wrapped up into a bundle using the tar command. This tar file has then been compressed using the gunzip utility ( a bit like winzip ).

So you need to unzip it, then untar it.

You can do this by clicking on it on the desktop

or more usually,

open a shell, change to the directory where the file is

type tar -zxvf yourfilename.tar.gz

This usually creates a subdirectory with the files in.

2) Change to the new directory

cd <your new dir>

and look for files called README or INSTALL

best to type mc for midnight commander, which lets you see a list of files and view them

3) Normally the process to build a set of files is along the following lines.

./configure // Configures the makefiles for your computer make // Builds the program make install // Copies the program to the correct directories

the make install step often requires you to be the superuser(root ) so its necessary to type su then the root password before the last step 4. after make install, if you did "su", type exit, to go back to being your own login user.

the program should now be installed, and may appear in a menu (kde,gnome etc ) or often you have to type its name.

5. Sometimes you need to tell the make process, where certain files are ..

when you type ./configure you should really type first ./configure --help

which will produce a long list of options

Anyway, this should get you started, it probably seems very confusing to start with, and using rpm's is fine to begin with.

Hope this helps dids

On Saturday 09 February 2002 12:24 am, Ozgeek wrote:

...

I am a beginner and would be grateful for help in how to open and install files with tar.gz SuSE will open the files OK and show a lot of files. However there doesn't appear top be an installation file. How do I go about installing these type of programmes. Thanks for your help.

Ozgeek