Linux/Python Issues

[Paul Boddie]

On 18 Feb, 16:39, MartinRineh... at gmail.com wrote:
> Paul Boddie wrote:
> > Here's one page which probably tells you stuff you already know:
>
> >http://wiki.python.org/moin/BeginnersGuide/Download
>
> Thank you! It says I need Python (which I've got) and the Python-devel
> package, which sounds like it might include Tkinter and IDLE. Now if
> only I knew where to get the Python-devel package ...

It would probably be the python-dev package if Linspire really is
based on Debian. However, that only gives you the Python headers, as
far as I remember. You would also need to get the packages for Tcl/Tk
including those providing the headers. And IDLE and Tkinter are
separate packages, too. But generally, just asking for the idle or
idle-python2.5 packages will give you the stack of packages you need
without any further thought required.

That said, if the problem is that Linspire doesn't provide Python 2.5
as a package, then you're back to installing the Tcl/Tk packages and
then building from source, configuring, building and installing Python
as mentioned earlier. You could instead attempt to port the generic
Debian package to Linspire, but this isn't for the timid. ;-)

If finding Tcl/Tk packages is also a problem, you could build Tcl/Tk
from scratch, too - something I've had to do in the distant past on
operating systems like Solaris. Then, it's a matter of telling
Python's configure program where you installed the Tcl/Tk headers and
libraries.

Paul

P.S. I'm not sure if I can advise you on the specifics around
Linspire. Ubuntu and Debian are quite transparent, and you can quite
easily find packages for them on packages.ubuntu.com and
packages.debian.org respectively. The whole CNR stuff and the
proprietary software slant of Linspire obscures the solution, in my
opinion.