tarball installation/download

**CaimSasori** · January 2nd, 2009

okay
so I'm new to ubuntu
I don't know much about it

and I'm looking to download Stepmania

and it's in a tarball

I'm unaware of the procedure of installing/downloading a tarball.

I've googled for about an hour

found a few links that didn't really help me very much.
I figured I could check the forums

anyone want to help me any?

~Caim

**handydan918** · January 2nd, 2009

Please post the exact filename that you have downloaded.

Also, before installing any program you should try to find it in synaptic.

**CaimSasori** · January 2nd, 2009

the exact filename is StepMania-3.9a-linux.tar.gz

I apologize for that

**oldos2er** · January 2nd, 2009

I found some instructions here: http://www.ubuntu-unlimited.com/?id=...owto1228505195

**bigO** · January 2nd, 2009

First things first you may not need to install from source. If you are looking for games check out http://www.playdeb.net/ and follow the instructions there. There have a bunch of games and stepmania is one of them.

As for installing from source I will see if I can't find you a good tut that explains it rather than just telling you what to do. though I can do that for you if playdeb doesn't work and you don't understand the tut.

I will repost with a link for you.

**handydan918** · January 2nd, 2009

Originally Posted by CaimSasori

the exact filename is StepMania-3.9a-linux.tar.gz

I apologize for that

try

Code:

tar -zxvf StepMania-3.9a-linux.tar.gz

and look for a README file.

There is no one way to install from a tarball, because it can contain anything!

**CaimSasori** · January 2nd, 2009

thanks everyone
I'll try your many different methods

**Pierrot Lafouine** · January 3rd, 2009

Originally Posted by bigO

First things first you may not need to install from source. If you are looking for games check out http://www.playdeb.net/ and follow the instructions there. There have a bunch of games and stepmania is one of them.

As for installing from source I will see if I can't find you a good tut that explains it rather than just telling you what to do. though I can do that for you if playdeb doesn't work and you don't understand the tut.

I will repost with a link for you.

Hi BigO
Did you find a link ?
I'm trying to install a tar ball (pgSlideShow.tar.gz) and tar doesn't work (seams to be in an other format then gunzip), I would be interested to read more on this

**taurus** · January 3rd, 2009

Originally Posted by Pierrot Lafouine

Hi BigO
Did you find a link ?
I'm trying to install a tar ball (pgSlideShow.tar.gz) and tar doesn't work (seams to be in an other format then gunzip), I would be interested to read more on this

If that is the exact name of the file that you've downloaded, what happens when you try to unpack it, assuming you have saved it to your desktop?

Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal

Code:

cd ~/Desktop
tar xvzf pgSlideShow.tar.gz

**Pierrot Lafouine** · January 3rd, 2009

under Ubuntu, tar zxvf works fine
under my Arm embedded computer using Debian based TS-Linux, this is the error message :
gzip:stdin:not in gzip format
tar:Child returned status 1
tar:Error exit delayed from previous errors

I tried this:
tar xf pgSlideShow.tar.gz

This is the error message I got :
tar:This is not like a tar archive
tar:Skipping to next header
tar:Error exit delayed from previous errors

Any idea how I can point the problem?
Is the file format, or tar command on TS-Linux cause this problem ?

Thanks