Re: [Aspell-user] Newbie help on installing

[Christoph Hintermüller]

Hi
Am Donnerstag, 13. Januar 2005 04:22 schrieb brandon:
> 
> if they are unclear or not. So, if someone could explain and/or point to a 
> primer I would be grateful
> 
> 1. When it says "./configure && make"
> 
> What does that mean exactly.
It says call the script which is located in the to directory of the unpacked 
sources. And after the script has completed succeffully call make to build 
the program

As the actual directory is and schould not be contained in the PATH variable 
(security reasons) you call the configure script with ./ ( short for the 
actual directory/path) preceeded. The && means logic AND. You could have 
typed the above in the follwoing way too

   prompt>./configure
   prompt>make

But the && version has the advantage that if configure fails make is never 
called. While in the two line version it may be that configure fails at top 
of a long list of tests which you than would have to scroll back to check if
it is safe to call make.
> I understand that I'm compiling from source, and I  
> do have the gcc compiler already on this server but am I supposed to 
download 
> the aspell tar.gz into a specific directory before compiling?
No you don't as the directory you unpack the sources into is only the 
temporary build directory. 
> 
> 2. After compiling do i have tell the program where to install?
> 
No you simply call 
  make install 
to ensure taht the program is installed into the proper directory. By default 
this is /usr/local/bin for binarys and other dubtrees of usr local like share 
lib include ...

If you want to change the installation base directory eg your home directory 
you have to do that by 
calling 
  ./configure --prefix=/home/<MyUserName>

For how to change default directories for installing different parts of the 
program call
 ./configure --help
> 3. When do I add a dictionary, before or after install?
after as you need aspell and helper programs from aspell distribution to 
properly build the dictionary.
> The instructions say  
> have to "make a path", but what does that mean?
cd to /usr/local/share if you have installed aspell in usr local
and call
  mkdir -p aspell/dicts
if you want to install the dictionary in the dicts subdirectory of aspell

the -p option of mkdir (make directory) ensures that the aspell directory is 
created prior to the dicts within aspell if aspell does not exist.

mor uppon mkdir see
  info mkdir
or 
  man mkdir
> Yeah, I came from the GUI world, so be nice :)
Isn't there any unix beginners guide arround on your site does it tell 
anything about directories or even about mkdir, cd, ls, dir, touch, rm and 
other tiny little programs or did you by a unix/linux vserver for your home 
business. Just asking ;-)
cu
Xris