[plug] library paths, Debian

[Denis Brown]

At 22:24 4/07/2003 +0800, James Devenish wrote:
>In message <Pine.LNX.3.96.1030704213801.5409B-100000 at cyllene.uwa.edu.au>
>on Fri, Jul 04, 2003 at 09:50:24PM +0800, Denis Brown wrote:
> > I can do some comparison testing, comparing the structures on the
> > (problem child) machine to another of similar config that is working.
> > Problem being that the working one has a few more bits & pieces so I
> > cannot be sure I'm really comparing fairly.
>
>Well, why not go to the heart of the problem? Is it true that the
>problem arises during ./configuration? If so, be aware that configure
>can generate errors that are misleading. Presumably you have a highly
>specific error message (e.g. "looking for zlib...not found" or such).

Doh! (tm)  When all else fails, check the simple things...

Installing zlib1g-dev fixed things in the configure department and allowed 
PostgreSQL (files) to compile and install.   Reached the "adduser postgres" 
part of the installation and got complaints (from the adduser perl script) 
not being able to find essential components in the @INC string.   After 
much head-banging, too late at night, I realised that the nice shiny 
perl-5.8.0 had installed itself as the resident perl.    A symlink in 
/usr/bin pointing back to the system's 5.6.1 installation fixed that up.

Thanks to James, Craig and others for words of wisdom.   The discussion 
about running old applications was helpful.   In many respects I've grown a 
bit lazy, relying on Debian's package management system to keep things in 
trim so this episode has allowed me to become more aware of the "under the 
hood" stuff.   Time permitting I must look at getting a handle on Debian's 
packaging with a view to rolling my own .debs from later application 
sources.  For instance, as above, their perl is at 5.6.1 where as the 
latest sources are 5.8.0 and implies feature and / or security enhancements 
available in the later release.   Maybe a dose of gentoo and / or crux 
would be a Good Thing (tm) to get under the hood a bit.

Cheers and thanks,
Denis