Hi all.
I'm having a little problem trying to get some programs to configure and
install properly in Debian.. Here's the most recent case:
I'm trying to install 'gnome-commander' from a .gz file I downloaded
from the developer's site. When I run the configure script, it ends up
giving me an error saying that it depends on 'FAM' and won't work
without it. However, I'm pretty sure I already have FAM installed! I
tried 'apt-get install fam' (after making sure that was what I wanted
with apt-cache), and it told me that I already have the latest version..
I've had similar problems with other programs I have tried to install
without using apt-get; the specifics change in each case, but they all
complain of not being able to find dependancies which I'm fairly sure I
have installed.

What do you suppose could be causing this, and how would I go about
fixing it?

Just in case you haven't figured it out already, I'm a new user of
Debian, and really have very little idea what I'm doing. So please be
gentle with your answers

Thanks in advance,
--Maxwell Terpstra

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Maxwell Terpstra writes:
> What do you suppose could be causing this, and how would I go about
> fixing it?

Why don't you just install the Debian gnome-commander package?
--
John Hasler
john@dhh.gt.org
Dancing Horse Hill
Elmwood, Wisconsin

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Maxwell W. Terpstra wrote:

> When I run the configure script, it ends up
> giving me an error saying that it depends on 'FAM' and won't work
> without it. However, I'm pretty sure I already have FAM installed! I
> tried 'apt-get install fam' (after making sure that was what I wanted
> with apt-cache), and it told me that I already have the latest version..

You need the development packages, like fam-dev. Do an apt-get fam-dev and
it'll give you quite nice results ;-)

Sybren
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John Hasler wrote:
> Why don't you just install the Debian gnome-commander package?

The copy on the developer's site is much newer than on my package
servers. ;(

--nax

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Sybren wrote:
> You need the development packages, like fam-dev. Do an apt-get fam-dev and
> it'll give you quite nice results ;-)
>
> Sybren

Thank you for your quick reply!
However, I'm still having problems
The closest thing I could find to what you suggested was called
libfam-dev. I installed that, but it hasn't seemed to make any
differnece in my problem. I haven't been able to find anything called
exactly 'fam-dev'.

--max

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Maxwell W. Terpstra wrote:

> The closest thing I could find to what you suggested was called
> libfam-dev. I installed that, but it hasn't seemed to make any
> differnece in my problem. I haven't been able to find anything called
> exactly 'fam-dev'.

Now that I actually try, me neither. Libfam-dev is the one I suggest, though
;-) Can you give us the full output of the ./configure command? I'll have a
look at it when I wake up (it's 4 o'clock in the night here ;-))

Sybren
--
If you want to know how to behave yourself on Usenet? Read
http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc1855.html

Do you think I'm rude, or don't you understand my answers? Read this page
[http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/faqs/sma...ions.html#intro]

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Maxwell W. Terpstra writes:
> The copy [of gnome-commander] on the developer's site is much newer than
> on my package servers.

Have you looked at the versions in testing and unstable? Unstable has
0.9.8-2.
--
John Hasler
john@dhh.gt.org
Dancing Horse Hill
Elmwood, Wisconsin

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John Hasler wrote:
> Maxwell W. Terpstra writes:
>
>>The copy [of gnome-commander] on the developer's site is much newer than
>>on my package servers.
>
>
> Have you looked at the versions in testing and unstable? Unstable has
> 0.9.8-2.

I've just been using good 'ol apt-cache searches to find the debian
package, and it's only given me one version... I'm not sure whether it
is set up to check testing/unstable releases or not (and I don't know
how to find out..).

--max

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Sybren wrote:
> Now that I actually try, me neither. Libfam-dev is the one I suggest, though
> ;-) Can you give us the full output of the ./configure command? I'll have a
> look at it when I wake up (it's 4 o'clock in the night here ;-))
>
> Sybren

the whole thing?! well... okay...
err, actually mozilla won't let me cut and paste from the terminal for
some reason, so I'll just try to give you what seem to be relevant / out
of ordinary parts:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
loading cache ./config.cache
checking for.....

*lots of checks*

configure: warning: *** Can't find the FAM library. GNOME Commander
depends on FAM to provide notification when files are altered by other
programs. FAM is available from http://oss.sgi.com/projects/fam. A patch
to add Linux Kernel 2.4 directory notify support to FAM (highly
desireable) is available from http://people.redhat.com/alexl/files/ ***

*more checks...*

GNOME Commander will be built with the following settings:
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
General:
Install path: /usr/local
Users:
Use FAM: no
Developers:
Build with GMemLogger: no
Generate debug printing: no

GNOME Commander depends on FAM to provide notification when files are
alt... *blah, blah (see above)*
---------------------------------------------------------------------

there it is
I'm a little suspicious of that first line personally... does that mean
that it's not actually doing any work and just reading the previous
configure results? If so, how do I clear these (just rm the
config.cache, or is there more to it?)

thanks again,
--max

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Maxwell W. Terpstra <mtaexr@uvic.ca> wrote:
> Sybren wrote:
>> You need the development packages, like fam-dev. Do an apt-get fam-dev and
>> it'll give you quite nice results ;-)

> Thank you for your quick reply!
> However, I'm still having problems

But what are they? We need error messages, not your impressions of what
may be wrong, which are clearly mistaken!

> The closest thing I could find to what you suggested was called
> libfam-dev. I installed that, but it hasn't seemed to make any
> differnece in my problem. I haven't been able to find anything called
> exactly 'fam-dev'.

So what?

Go find what you need and install it. We can't tell what you need from
here! How are you deducing that you need what it is that you clearly
don't need? From the output of configure? Configure knows nothing
whatsoever about packaging or debian's build system! It can only tell
you what is wrong, not which source or binary package you need to install
in order to be able to compile it.

If you want a compilation tuned to debian, use apt-get source.

(or build-source, or whatever it is now, if you want to do it
recursively).

Learn to use your system!

Be specific about your problem and you may be helped. Being vague, as you
are being, is only an exercise in frustration for you and us. So please
learn to post meaningful information - the data on which you are
basing your opinions, precisely as it is, cut and pasted from the
screen.


Peter

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