Sunday September 18 2016 07:04, you wrote to me:

 rc> This has been, still, and will continue to be Linux's DOWNFALL and
 rc> GREATEST IMPEDIMENT, software distribution...

Software distribution is one of (at least linux) the strengths. On rare
occations I find that I need to build my own binaries, like binkd. It is not
part of my distribution so I always go grab the version I want and get it done.

 rc> I love Linux! Don't get me wrong... there are portions of the
 rc> "culture" I despise even more than that of the crap from msloth
 rc> land...but this is getting way tangetial....

Different distributions have different ways of doing things as far as packages
go. On the debian type distros the version that is released doesn't change
unless there is a very good reason to do that. Even then the needed changes are
 quite often back ported.

 AI>> zlib-dev and bzip2-dev installed to build support to compress
 AI>> pkts on the fly.

 rc> This is always the issue with compiling... finding this stuff... when
 rc> its not listed outright..

Binkd will still compile without bzip2-dev available but without some features.
 I think it's good to have so I just wanted to point that one out to you. Some
things like bzip2-dev are not installed by default because most folks don't use
 it.

On my slackware box all this stuff I need to compile things is installed
already, I seldom need to go looking for dependencies. That's probably because
on slackware you are going to need it.. ;)

 AI>> It might be enough to add yourself to the ftn group to have
 AI>> read/write permission to the outbound/inbound.

 rc> That could be, and I thought about going that route as well... I just
 rc> decided to move binkd to ME! (Always about ME! :) ;)  )  and be done
 rc> with it....

 rc> I get where this whole ftn:ftn thing is headed, but in the REAL WORLD
 rc> I am not so sure that plan works...

It does work, I have done it before. I prefer to build my own and run binkd as
my regular user. You can still do that with a packaged binkd but I just build
my own.

 rc> Thanks for the info...as when I was at the binkd site it didn't
 rc> outline this, and my main machines are not setup for git/cvs/svn... I
 rc> can spin up some VM's in VMWare and play with it...

IIRC cvs is installed as part of build-essential. It's a good way to keep upto
date but you can also download a tarball (or zip) from the bink site, either
way is good.

 rc> But honestly the few times I've been successful with compiling has
 rc> only been when there have been exact detailed steps aka Compiling for
 rc> Absolute Total Moronic Idiots!  (I don't program in compiled
 rc> languages, Python, BASH, php, html, SQL, ECMAScript, pascal back in
 rc> the day)

Don't feel bad. I don't code either. Not at all. If I can download a tarball I
can usually get the job done.. as long as someone else has done the coding.. ;)

 rc> sudo apt-get install stupidlib stupidlib-dev anotherlib anotherlib-dev

Those -dev packages are what we need when compiling software. It's very handy
though we just need them installed to satisfy dependencies.

 rc> And don't even get me stated on RPM's and RH/CentOS! :) URRRGHH!

The first distribution I used was redhat many years ago. I understand.. :)

 rc> Thanks again for the pointes and tips, and info, assistance... when I
 rc> get a lab day to try this I will spin up a VM to give a whirl, maybe I
 rc> can make a DEB for 14.04 ...

I can make a slackware package, or a package for archlinux, it's fairly
straight forward. Maybe one day I can do debian packages too but not today.


... I used to think I was indecisive, but now I'm not so sure.
--- GoldED+/LNX 1.1.5-b20160322