[lug] Installing Software Packages

[Charlie Rose]

Gentlefolk ....  Newbie speaking!

Here I am, trying to install StarOffice 6.0 on my Mandrake 9.0 system, and 
I'm totally baffled. I don't know how to install a software package with Linux.

I went to /mnt/cdrom/linux/office60 (in the GUI), and saw a bunch of files 
which included one named "setup" that was identified as an executable. To 
me, running setup would have installed the package ... only, by clicking or 
double-clicking it, it wouldn't run.

The documentation said that I should "open the CD-ROM with execute rights". 
Well, /cdrom has rwxrwxrwx privileges automatically, so I don't know what 
the documentation is talking about. Incidentally, /mnt/cdrom/linux has 
r-xr-xr-x, /mnt/cdrom/linux/office60 has r-xr-xr-x, and most all the files 
therein have r--r--r-- privs except for setup which has r-xr-xr-x.

The documentation also says that I can copy the /linux/office60 files to a 
temporary directory on my hard drive, and install from there. From 
/mnt/cdrom/linux/office60, I did a cp * /home/charlie/tmp. Almost all the 
files got copied. I can see those that didn't go in the GUI file list in 
Konqueror, but when I try to copy these files, I'm told they don't exist. 
As a matter of fact, as I navigate around the CD, directories keep 
disappearing on me.

I've looked in the Linux books I have, but none of them tell me how to 
install commercial software packages. If any of you would like to hold my 
hand a bit, or point me to a good reference, I'd really appreciate it!


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Charlie Rose               FAX: 303-545-6674
Innovative Scientific Analysis and Computing
P.O. Box 1636, Boulder, Colorado, 80306-1636

Web Site:                 <http://www.ISAaC.com>
My PGP Public Key: 
<http://pgpkeys.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0xF57617F9>
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