installing firefox - stupid newbie question 3

[peterb1985]

Hi

Can anyone tell where i should install programs. I've downloaded firefox and its saved in my home directory, but i think that if i extract and install the program it will be installed in my home directory. Is this right?

Where should i install programs in linux? Is there a sort of program files folder (sorry for the microsoft reference. boo!)

Thanks

Linux Newbie

 

[TonyGroves]

I use /opt/firefox , with a link in /usr/bin to the Firefox startup script. That would be normal procedure for big programs like that, but your distribution might have different standard locations.

 

[chipperMDW]

Where should i install programs in linux? Is there a sort of program files folder (sorry for the microsoft reference. boo!)

You just asked a mouthful.


Normally and historically on Unix, files are grouped by their type and use rather than by which "package" they belong to.

That means that all executables go in one directory, all libraries go into another directory, and all documentation goes into another directory, etc.

As you might imagine, this scheme makes it difficult to keep track of or to remove all files related to a single package (i.e. to "uninstall" something).


For this reason, most distributions provide a package manager that installs files in the usual places, but keeps track of them in a database or through some other means. To do this, you usually need to acquire special package files. In general, it is a good idea to grab package files made for your distribution and use its package management facilities.


Of course, sometimes a package file for your distribution does not yet exist, even though the software is available as source code from its maintainers.

In this case, you can usually configure your software to install in [tt]/opt[/tt] or [tt]/usr/local[/tt]. You can install directly into those locations, or you can install into a "package-specific" subdirectory. The latter option allows you to easily remove the software if your distribution ever releases its own package of that software and you want to use that.

There are even specific packages like Encap and Stow meant to help you manage software under [tt]/usr/local[/tt].


Finally, if you don't have superuser priveleges, or if you have a package meant to be used only by a given user, that's when you'd install into your home directory. Again, you'd need to configure the pacakge to do so, first.


I'll stop here before I end up writing a book on the subject, but feel free to ask for explanation of anything if you're curious.


The advice I'd give you, then, is to grab a distribution-specific package of Firefox. That'll be the easiest option. That means you probably either want a [tt].rpm[/tt] or a [tt].deb[/tt], but that depends on which distribution you have. Which one is it, by the way?


If you want to install from source, you can do that, but you'll probably want to ask some more questions.

 

[jstreich]

/opt is for packages all together
Or
/usr/local is for stuff that isn't part of the normal distro, and the execuatbles will end up in /usr/local/bin the libraries in /usr/local/lib ... ect. When in doubt let the install script install to the default locations, and everythin should go fine.

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[gx3]

Just a small comment. Unfortunately if you have a distro like my Knoppix and wish to add the latest Firefox, Macromedia, Adobe, Java, etc. from their respective sites, it all ends up in home. What are the cleaning people going to think!

 

[stefanwagner]

knoppix isn't meant for hd-installation, but normally let's you decide which flavour to install: knoppix, debian or ... (forgot it).
If you choose a debian-installation, you should be able to install to classical places.
I did it last week.

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[SuperNish]

/usr/local is also good place
and create a sim link in /usr/bin