Installing Something (gnomeppp) On Ubuntu

[rob86 2]

I want to install this app Gnome-PPP which I downloaded from http://www.gnomefiles.org/app.php?soft_id=41

It apparently is an archive containing source code. I have no clue what to do with it, all the instructions I've found say to type sudo apt-get install gnome-ppp , but that does nothing for me. Do I have to extract the source code or something?

[rvalkass 5]

all the instructions I've found say to type sudo apt-get install gnome-ppp , but that does nothing for me

It'll do something, even if it's just an error message. Could you try that command again, and copy whatever the output is to here?

[truefusion 3]

According to this post you seem to have installed what you wanted. But let me provide some general tips on how to compile programs on a Linux system. Most programs you'll find for Linux use the GNU autoconf and automake tools for making it easier to compile their program. In these cases, the first step into getting the program compiled is by running

CONSOLE

./configure

within the folder that you extracted from the archive. What the configure script does is it goes around looking for header files to compile the program. If it cannot find them, it should inform you what program development files you're missing. In the repository, the package you'll need to install will most of the time end with "-dev" ("-devel" tends to be for RPM-based systems). After installing the needed dependencies, you run the configure script again and once it passes, it'll generate makefiles. If the program does not come with a configure script, then it probably just needs you to execute the makefiles—rarely, if at all, do you ever have to generate the configure script yourself.

Makefiles are a bit difficult to debug if you were to ever run into a make error. But to execute the makefiles, just run

CONSOLE

make

Make errors can occur for many reasons: it could be due to a badly written makefile, badly written code, missing a dependency, et cetera. In the first two cases mentioned, unless you know how to edit makefiles or debug the source code, then you should just quit here. In the third case mentioned, the output from the makefile should inform you of the file(s), in which case you can use apt-file to search the repository for packages that contain these files and install those packages and try again.

If the make process ended without an error, you can "install" the program (i.e. assuming the generated makefiles supports install) by running

CONSOLE

sudo make install

If the program is a GUI program and not a console-based program, then it most likely came with its own desktop file, and you should see the program appear in your applications menu some time after the "installation." Do note that installing programs in this fashion does not mean that it'll show up as "installed" when looking in the repository. In fact, installing both (the one you compiled and the one in the repository) could cause the program to stop working or some unexpected result.

To clean up after yourself, you can run

CONSOLE

make distclean

This will remove all object and other files that were generated by the makefiles and make the folder contain only the files that are found in the archive that you've downloaded.