Place of Stuff

As any reader of this blog will know, I am a big fan of installing from source. My OS of choice, Slackware, makes this very easy and doesn’t break anything if you do this. I am, though, well aware that this isn’t for everyone - in fact, I break my own rule if it’s convenient.

Slackware packages end in .tgz, which can be confusing since that is also the way that normal tar balls can end. The usual way to install these is to type (as root) installpkg <packagename>.tgz and let the dialogue run. This then expands the archived install files into the correct places on your system. Removing or upgrading packages is equally as easy, simply exchange the installpkg for removepkg or upgradepkg. This method is inbuilt to Slackware and is the most basic way of installing Slackware packages. You could also use pkgtool which gives an ncurses frontend to a number of Slackware commands.

If you like automated downloads, you could use Swaret, Slapt-Get or Slackpkg, each of which will download the install files to your system and install them for you. These three methods are very much automated, though, and this can mean that things will break and you won’t immediately know why. Use them at your own risk, though I have only ever broken my system through my own stupidity.
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Just like everyone else, I like to listen to music. I have an iPod for when I’m on the train or walking and I have my music files stored in iTunes. Unfortunately, Apple have so locked down their proprietary format that you just can’t listen to your music in the native format on non Windows or Apple computers.

By converting your music to MP3 format you can extend the number of media players it will play on. As a KDE user, I like to use Amarok. I won’t go into the method I used to convert the files here, I’m unsure of the legality and I’m sure you can all use search engines by now. What I will do is to explain, with pictures and words, how I go about installing Amarok to give as full functionality as I need. Your methods may vary, but this works for me. I did something similar in the post Words and Pictures in Linux and that still works as a handy reference for me.

Firstly, I am using Slackware 12.0 with KDE 3.5.7. I will be installing practically everything from source. All of the programs I install will probably have prepackaged versions for your own distro (.rpm, .deb or whatever) and there are also likely to be Slackbuilds available. I still like to install from source so that’s what I’ll be doing.
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