We all know how simple it is to install downloaded applications on the Windows platform. What would you say if I told you it was just as easy to install a downloaded application on the Linux platform? And not just on Ubuntu…but on other Linux distributions. Would you be surprised? Would you be in disbelief? Well, for those disbelievers I have the proof for you today. In this article I will show you how to install downloaded applications, in Linux, with a double click.

What this applies to

Before you think this is going to show you how to install an application from source with a double click, think again. This will only apply to the packages created for a systems package manager. What that means is you can install .deb files in an apt-based (or dpkg-based) system (such as Ubuntu) or .rpm files in an RPM-based system (such as Fedora). If you are wanting to install from source, you will have to employ the command line tool. For the rest…you are just a double click away from installation goodness.

The dependency issue

There can, of course, be issues with this installation. The biggest issue will be dependencies. If a file you are attempting to install has unmet dependencies it will not install. When this happens you can try to meet those dependencies by using your Add/Remove Software tool. Or you can attempt to download the dependency files (after googling them and finding the right version) and install in the same way you are going to install the main application. This is one of the many reasons why it is always best to use your package management system. There are, of course, times when you need a package installed that it not in your package management system and there are no repositories for that tool. That is when this method will come into play.

How it works

Believe it or not, it works in much the same way as it does on the Windows  platform. Let’s see just how this works. I am going to install a package (one that I will writing about very soon) called Hot Copy. For that tool I have downloaded the .zip file (which contains binaries in both .deb and .rpm format. That file will have downloaded to my ~/Downloads directory. Here are the steps for installation (I will be explaining this from the GNOME desktop).

Step 1

Open up Nautilus to the ~/Downloads directory. In this directory you will see the .zip file you downloaded.

Figure 1

Step 2

Double click on the newly downloaded file. This will open up the archive file to display all of the contents. In the case of this file there will be two directories and a help file. The two directories will be for each of the different hardware architecture (x86 for 32 bit systems and x86_64 for 64 bit systems). Double click on the directory for your machines architecture to reveal the included installation files (see Figure 1).

Step 3

Figure 2

For the Ubuntu installation I am going to install both .deb files in this package. First I will double click the hotcopy .deb file. When I do this it will open up the GDebi package installation tool. When this new window opens (see Figure 2)  all I have to do is click the Install package buttton. GDebi will ask for the users password to complete the installation. You might recognize GDebi from any time you have downloaded a .deb file from the web. it’s the same routine.

When the installation is complete GDebi will report the installation is finished and you can then close the progress window and then close the GDebi window.

That’s it. And, believe it or not, the process is pretty much the same on the Fedora distribution as well.

Final thoughts

I bet you never thought installation applications in Linux was this easy. Well, Linux has come a long, long way since the early days when the command line was a requirement. Now, it seems, the command line is only an option. Although I can’t imagine myself using Linux without the command line (it’s how I was taught after all), it is completely possible to do so.

I’m sure you have read plenty of my Linux articles that outline how to install with Ubuntu. That distribution takes advantage of apt-get and dpkg for command line installation. In the OpenSuSE distribution the zypper tool is used for this same task. Believe it or not, zypper is just as easy to use as is the Ubuntu equivalent. And in this article you will see just that.

What is zypper?

The zypper tool is the command line interface to the ZYpp system management library. Zypper can be used to install/update/remove software, manage repositories, perform queries, and more. Using the zypper command does require root privileges, so you will have to first su to the root user before you issue any of the zypper commands.

Usage

The basic structure of the zypper command looks like:

zypper GLOBAL_OPTIONS COMMAND COMMAND_OPTIONS

Although it looks a bit complex it’s not. Let’s take a look at the various tasks you will perform with the zypper command.

Installing software

Installing software with zypper is simple. The command will look like this:

zypper install SOFTWARE

Where SOFTWARE is the name of the software you want to install.

Say, for example, I want to install Scribus (the desktop publishing application). To do this the command would look like:

zypper install scribus

Removing software

Now let’s say you want to remove a piece of software. The command structure for deleting software looks like:

zypper remove SOFTWARE

Sticking with our example, if you want to remove Scribus from your OpenSuSE machine you would issue the command:

zypper remove scribus

Searching for software

Figure 1

Say you don’t know what Scribus is, or you aren’t sure if you know the name of the package. You could use zypper to search the cached database for installation candidates like so:

zypper search scribus

The above command would return something like what you see in Figure 1. As you can see, zypper will report back all possible applications for the search string.

Updating with zypper

Updating with zypper is incredibly easy. Issue the command zypper update and if there are any updates available to your system they will be reported and all you need to do is type “y” (no quotes) and then hit Enter to run all of the updates.

Distribution upgrade with zypper

If you want to do a distribution upgrade with zypper you would use the dup command like so:

zypper dup

With that single command you will upgrade your OpenSuSE distribution (if the upgrade is available).

Final thoughts

Command line package management in OpenSuSE is about as simple as it gets. If you hesitate to use the command line for this task in OpenSuSE, I hope this article has persuaded you there is nothing to fear. OpenSuSE is an outstanding distribution with a lot to offer and it’s package management is on par with just about any other system.



Well, there’s a handy tool that will take care of all of that for you. The tool is called APTonCD. What this tool does is create a CD with all of the applications you have installed – basically a portable repository. And, with the same tool, you can restore all of the packages on the CD – all from one convenient GUI.

Features

Choose specific packages on your local machine (or choose all).

Download entire repositories.

Burn CD/DVD from within APTonCD.

Create and restore from same GUI.

Auto-selection of dependencies option.

Easy to use.

Installation

The installation is simple:

1. Open up your Add/Remove Software Application.
2. Enter “aptoncd” in the search bar (no quotes).
3. Mark APTonCD for installation.
4. Click Apply.

Once the installation is complete you can close out the installation tool and get ready to use APTonCD.

Starting and using APTonCD

Figure 1

Once installed APTonCD is found in the Administration sub-menu of the System menu (GNOME desktop). Figure 1 shows the main window for the application. From this window you can either create a new CD or restore from an already existing CD.

To create a new CD click the Create button which will open up another window. In this new window (see Figure 2) the packages will be collected and, eventually, listed out for you. From this listing you can select the packages you want to include on your CD. By default all of the packages are selected.This window will also includ the total size of the completed installation. As you can see (in Figure 2) the total size of my restore CD will be 596 MB (some of the packages are not selected).

Figure 2

If you want to add packages not already on your system you can click the Add drop down and select either Packages or Folder and then navigate to those files/folders. You can also open up Nautilus and drag and drop packages into the APTonCD window.

Once you have selected all of your packages you might want to go to the Edit menu and select “Auto-select Dependencies” to ensure all dependencies are met on your CD. Now it’s time to burn. When you’re ready click the Burn button which will open up a Disc Properties window (see Figure 3). In this new window you select your medium, the destination for the image file, a file name, and whether or not you want to create a meta-package. The meta-package is one package that

Figure 3

includes all packages on the CD as dependencies. This makes restoration very simple in that all APTonCD has to do is select one package to install.

When you click Apply APTonCD will begin to create the .iso image that you will then burn onto disk using your favorite CD burning software.

When the iso has been created a new window will open asking if you want to burn the CD/DVD. This window will allow you to select that application you want to burn with. If you chose you can click No and burn the CD/DVD later. I have found the burn portion of the APTonCD to be a bit flaky, so I just always burn by open up K3B and burning the image.

Restoring

I would like to say that APTonCD can easily handle the installation of your packages with a simple click of a button. It can not. What APTon CD does is create portable repositories. So you can use the APTonCD restore option to basically add your CD repository for installation.  I have found, however, the best way to install the entirety of the packages is with the tried and true command line. This allows you to quickly get all of your packages installed with a couple of easy commands. What you will want to do is this:

1. Insert your CD/DVD created by APTonCD.
2. Open up a command line.
3. Change to the directory where you CD is located with the command cd /media/cdrom (Note: Your CD might be located in a different directory).
4. Change into the packages directory with the command cd packages.
5. Issue the command sudo dpkg -i *deb which will install all packages on the CD.
6. After the installation is complete you MIGHT have to use Syanptic in the event their are broken packages.

Close out the command prompt and check your Applications menu, you should be good to go.

Final thoughts

I hope that the developers of APTonCD will some day make it much easier to restore from the GUI. But even with the inconvenience of having to use the command line for quick restoration, APTonCD is a very handy tool.

I have touched on this topic before in my article “Installing From the Command Line“. That was just grazing the surface. In this article you will learn a bit more about the rpm command line package management system.

As you may (or may not know) the structure of the RPM command is:

rpm {ARGUMENTS} [OPTIONS] filename

both ARGUMENTS and OPTIONS will depend upon what you are doing. The possibilities are:

• Install: For installation you lead with the i argument (e.g. -ivh)
• Upgrade: For upgrade you lead with the U argument (e.g. -Uvh)
• Remove: For removal you lead with with the e argument (e.g. -evh)
• Query: For querying if a package is installed lead with the (e.g. -q)

RPM also has some very important other tools and arguments that I want to focus on. Some of these arguments should only be used as a last resort and some of them could become necessary over time.

Special Upgrade or Install Arguments

There are some lesser known arguments for upgrading or installing worth mentioning. The first of these I want to mention is:

–oldpackage This argument allows you to replace a newer package with an older package. This can come in handy when a newer version of a package comes with bugs or removes features that you liked.

–nodeps This argument tells rpm to not do a dependency check before installing or upgrading a package. Use this wisely and sparingly or you will have packages that will not run. I take advantage of this argument when installing packages that have features (which depend upon packages not installed) that I do not want or need. But before using this I make sure my system meets all other dependencies.

–force This argument will force an install even if it conflicts with another package (the same package or another package). Using this argument can be dangerous and should be used only if you know for sure it will not break your system.

–test This will run a test transaction. No packages will actually be installed and all conflicts will be reported.

–nosignature This will not verify a package or package header signature before installing.

–excludedocs This will tell rpm to install the package but not the package included (if any) documentation.

Erasing Options

Here are some helpful erasing options.

–nodeps This is the same as the installation version

–repackage This will repackage the application you are removing. Very handy if you decide you want to re-install the package.

Updating rpm database

One very important use of rpm is to rebuild the rpm database. I have had the rpm database become corrupt for one reason or another. At that point rpm will have trouble doing anything. When you find rpm not being able to execute tasks, one of the reasons will be a corrupt database. You will most likely see some sort of warning referencing a problem with the database. To fix this issue use the –rebuilddb option. This is used like so:

rpm –rebuilddb -v

and will take some time to complete.

Final Thoughts

And there you have it. A closer look at the rpm package manager with regards to lesser known arguments and options. I hope this helps you get to know the rpm system a little better.