Installation - Guidance For Linux Novices

[centec2b]

I have been singularly impressed with Qcad and but find the "vagueness" on installation in Linux puzzling.

I spent most of last night trawling round the web/forum/site looking for guidance. Perhaps I looked in the wrong place but I did give this forum's search facility a lot of work!

I have been able to successfully install in my home folder but it would appear the preference is for folder /opt. This is in turn requires superuser powers etc, which is an area I am very vague on except that there seems to be stern messages in Ubuntu about being very careful when invoking superuser powers.

Could I suggest a specific guide to this subject would be very useful for linux novices like me.

Perhaps I ought to finish by saying this is not a complaint, just a suggestion to make qcad even better

Cheers
centec2b

[andrew]

Disclaimer: do not read this if you have strong views about Linux.

The main reason why it is not possible to document the installation under Linux in a user friendly, detailed way is the vast variety of Linux distributions, Linux distribution versions, windows managers, GUI tools and over zealous personal preferences there are.

The most basic installation of QCAD consists of one step: extracting the downloaded file.

Running QCAD consists of two steps: changing into the directory where QCAD was installed and running the QCAD application from there.

I am aware that the installation of QCAD under Linux is not as user friendly as for example under Windows but we tried to keep it as simple as possible for the user while not creating a huge effort on our side (e.g. by creating tons of RPMs for each single distribution flavor there is).

In command line lingo installing and running QCAD works like this:

Installation:

Code: Select all

cp /your/download/directory/qcad-2.2.2.0-1-prof.linux.x86.tar.gz /your/installation/directory
cd /your/installation/directory
tar xfvz qcad-2.2.2.0-1-prof.linux.x86.tar.gz


Running QCAD:

Code: Select all

cd /your/installation/directory
cd qcad-2.2.2.0-1-prof.linux
./qcad


"/your/download/directory" is the directory where your browser has downloaded the file.
"/your/installation/directory" is the directory where you want to install QCAD.

Where things should be installed under Linux is yet another religious war in which I will not participate. /opt or /something is probably appropriate if multiple users are using the Linux installation and need to run QCAD. /home/yourname/something is probably more appropriate if you are the only user on the system or only you need to run QCAD.

QCAD is unproblematic to install (and uninstall) since it does not spread its files all over the directory tree like most Linux applications / distributions do. Most Linux users find that bad practice, but in the last 10 years we have found that this solves a lot of installation related problems.

Of course you can also install QCAD with GUI tools, but again there are so many differences between Linux distributions and tools that it makes little sense to describe only one such process.

Note that I have been using Linux almost exclusively for more than 12 years and I do love it in many ways. However, the Linux world is very versatile (read 'a big mess') and after all that time even I am not always comfortable with this.

[centec2b]

Disclaimer: do not read this if your have religious views about Linux..........

Andrew - thank you - this is a brill resume of installation under Linux and will be of great help to other Linux novices.

PS read header and footer - break out into wry smile - think yes but its still a broad church and its getting more lay converts like me every day...

Thanks again!

centec2b

[topaco]

I am new to Ubuntu, currently running 11.10 , anyone have any known issues they have run into while working with QCAD?