Install when you do not have a deb package

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Sometimes you find a program you want to have, but don't f ind it in the repositories and worse, you don't even find a .deb package.

This is a somewhat tricky situation. The beauty of Linux is (among other things) the really simple way to install programs as long as you keep "within borders". But as simple as that is, it is equally hard to install when you are forced to go "over the border".


INSTALL FROM RPM

So if you get a rpm (Red Hat package manager) or a tgz problems arise.

Luckily, some help is available in the repositories. Install alien (you can install it via Synaptic). Lets say you have downloaded rpm packages that are for Red hat. The best would be if you could download a .deb package but you can't. Alien can convert between deb and rpm and also tgz. When alien is installed run the following command: sudo alien -i what_you_want_to_install.rpm (or what_you_want_to_install.tgz) The above command will unpack the rpm package into a directory, create a deb package and then install it on your system. Of course, you can uninstall the package at a later date by using the relevant dpkg command. You can find out more here: http://linuxhelp.blogspot.com/2005/06/convert-between-rpm-deb-and-tgz.html


INSTALL FROM SOURCE

In case it does not work, take a look here to see how to install from source: http://monkeyblog.org/ubuntu/installing/#source

The page is also good for any of your other installing needs :)

Here is another helpful link
http://home.nyc.rr.com/computertaijutsu/tarball.html

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