You have downloaded or otherwise acquired a software package. Most
likely it is archived (tarred) and compressed
(gzipped), in .tar.gz
or .tgz
form. First
copy it to a working directory. Then untar and gunzip
it. The appropriate command for this is tar xzvf
filename, where filename is the name of the
software file, of course. The de-archiving process will usually install
the appropriate files in subdirectories it will create. Note that if
the package name has a .Z suffix, it will require
uncompress PACKAGENAME, then tar xvf PACKAGENAME
rather than the above procedure.
Sometimes the archived file must be untarred and installed from
the user's home directory, or perhaps in a certain other directory, as
specified in the package's config info. Should you get an error message
attempting to untar it, this may be the reason. Read the
package docs, especially the README
and/or Install
files, if present, and edit the config files and/or Makefiles
as necessary, consistent with the installation instructions. Note that
you would not ordinarily alter the Imake
file, since
this could have unforseen consequences. Some software packages permit
automating this process by running make install to emplace the
binaries in the appropriate system areas.
Occasionally, you may need to update or incorporate bug fixes into the
unarchived source files using a patch file
that lists the
changes. The doc files and/or README
file will inform you
should this be the case. The normal syntax for invoking Larry Wall's
powerful patch
utility is patch < patchfile.
You may now proceed to the build stage of the process.