[NTLUG:Discuss] tar [question]

[George E. Lass]

Shel Johnson wrote:
> 
> When running the tar -xvf or tar -xzvf commands, is it a
> good idea to do this in the directory of the program that I
> want to upgrade?.. Here's an example: I have Netscape 4.74
> and want to upgrade to 4.75.. Do I download the tar.gz to
> /netscape then tar -xzvf it there?.. or can I download the
> tar.gz to any directory I choose??...

*Most* tarballs will have an installation "script" included,
such as "make install" so it really doesn't matter what directory
you download to.  It might be a good idea to do a tar -tvf or -ztvf
to check the contents of the tarball so that you can get an idea
of what directories will be created when you do the extract.

That said, I usually download tarballs to /usr/src, because the
tarball usually creates a directory like ./communicator-4.75.....
when you run tar -x.....

George