Hi all,
I'm sure this has been discussed since the last Ice Age but I googled and didn't see anything besides fanboy posts saying their method was engraved in granite and was the one and only way to go about it correctly.
Does anyone have pro and cons or anecdotal opinions about whether it's better to download source code and compile and install it locally ('make install' or something like that) or just get the binaries (Isn't that what the pre-compiled packages are called?)
I remember many moons ago in the early 90's, you could kind of optimize software for your particular hardware if you compiled mostly everything yourself. Of course there are quite a few things that may not work out right or be too complicated to compile locally but I know there are quite a few packages that can be.
Thank you for any opinions.
As always,
Hugh
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Better to compile locally or just get compiled packages?
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Do not post support questions here. Before you post read the forum rules. Topics in this forum are automatically closed 6 months after creation.
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ThinkingMonkey
Better to compile locally or just get compiled packages?
Last edited by LockBot on Wed Dec 28, 2022 7:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Topic automatically closed 6 months after creation. New replies are no longer allowed.
Reason: Topic automatically closed 6 months after creation. New replies are no longer allowed.
Re: Better to compile locally or just get compiled packages?
Moved to chat as this isn't a support request, but asking for opinions.
Packages installed from Software Manager are automatically updated for security issues. Packages often also have tailored build configurations aimed at better performance, hardened security, or improved integration with Linux distro release they are built for. Possibly also source code patches are applied by the package maintainers for the same. This is the work the package maintainers and security teams do.
Packages are authenticated to not have been tampered with before installing. Packages can be quickly installed and dependencies are checked before installing/removing them.
If you compile from source all that responsibility falls with you. I've yet to see any meaningful evidence that the time & effort you have to spend tuning build configuration and compiling software specific for your hardware gives you any (humanly) noticeable performance improvements (as I assume that is the point). With your computer most of the time idling waiting for you to do something, it makes little sense on home computers in my opinion (servers are a different case). If you have some specific need to recompile a program with your build configuration or patches, you can use this tutorial: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=178574
Packages installed from Software Manager are automatically updated for security issues. Packages often also have tailored build configurations aimed at better performance, hardened security, or improved integration with Linux distro release they are built for. Possibly also source code patches are applied by the package maintainers for the same. This is the work the package maintainers and security teams do.
Packages are authenticated to not have been tampered with before installing. Packages can be quickly installed and dependencies are checked before installing/removing them.
If you compile from source all that responsibility falls with you. I've yet to see any meaningful evidence that the time & effort you have to spend tuning build configuration and compiling software specific for your hardware gives you any (humanly) noticeable performance improvements (as I assume that is the point). With your computer most of the time idling waiting for you to do something, it makes little sense on home computers in my opinion (servers are a different case). If you have some specific need to recompile a program with your build configuration or patches, you can use this tutorial: http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=178574
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ThinkingMonkey
Re: Better to compile locally or just get compiled packages?
Hi,
Thanks for the info and sorry about the misplaced posting.
Thanks for the info and sorry about the misplaced posting.