Re: glibc 2.3.3 prefix /usr/local confustion

[Paul Jarc]

Kevin Hawkins <address@hidden> wrote:
> So, information comming from configure says that installing to '/usr/local'
> could make my system "totally unusable", but information comming from the FAQ
> says that installing to '/usr/local' "is safe".  Which is true?

What I gather is that if you install in /usr, you must be very
careful, since you're replacing what the system is using all the time.
But if you install anywhere else (including /usr/local), that
installation won't be usable without some extra work, since gcc, ld,
etc., won't look in that directory by default.

I can imagine situations where installing in /usr/local could be
harmful - /usr/local/lib might be listed in ld.so.conf, so programs
might start picking up the new libc.so, while some other libraries
might still be only in /usr/lib, and they might be incompatible.  I
think this is no more dangerous than installing in /usr, though.

> ../glibc-2.3.3/configure \
>   --with-add-ons \
>   --enable-add-ons=linuxthreads \
>   --prefix=/usr/local/glibc-2.3.3 \
>   --with-headers=/usr/src/linux-2.4.16/include
>
> And all was well; configure exited with no errors or warnings.  Should I go
> with this solution?

That should at least be harmless, assuming nothing on your system
refers to /usr/local/glibc-2.3.3 already.  Using it from there is
another problem.


paul