Re: compiling from source - where to install

[cjw44@cam.ac.uk (Colin Watson)]

ija@eaze.net (Ian Alexander) wrote:
>Hello all.  New to Debian, and have a few questions.  When installing
>software from source: what is the official/suggested way of doing this in
>Debian? Obviously, /usr/local is under my control according to the FHS.  
>But is there a suggested way of handling this on a Debian system?  Also,
>does it make a difference if there is a dpkg available for said software?
>My first thought is to do a "./configure --prefix=/usr/local" but thought
>I'd check with you Deb-Gurus first.  :)

I'd use /usr/local myself; in fact, under most circumstances I'd use a
subdirectory of that and then use stow, which is fantastic for managing
a large /usr/local tree.

If you've got the source for the software using 'apt-get source' or
similar (in which case the source tree will have a debian/
subdirectory), then changing to the top-level directory of the source
tree and typing 'debuild' will produce a .deb of that package, which you
can then install with dpkg. You'll need at least the devscripts and
dpkg-dev packages for this, and possibly others.

HTH,

-- 
Colin Watson                                           [cjw44@cam.ac.uk]