moving programs in Linux?

[mjdodd]

I have a EEEPC (small notebook runnning Linux natty nahwal.

I also have a USB 2Gb key formatted in EXT3, which shows up in the file manager and on the desktop when inserted

How can I use the usb for installations of programs? (how do I tell them where to install?) or how do I move programs onto the usb and run them from the usb. I do not particularly want to use the USB as a boot

I like linux but have too much windows experience to fully understand how to do the above.

thanks in advance

M

[evstevemd]

Ubuntu is debian family of Linux Distros. So you can install using dpkg with command
sudo dpkg -i my_package_name.deb
or just windowish, right click the file and open with either GDebi or software center (if you didnt disturb things just double click it!)

[rubberman]

Most programs/packages contain executables, scripts, libraries, configuration settings, and possibly databases or other files. They need to be where the program expects them to be, such as in /usr/bin, /etc, /opt, /usr/share, /usr/lib, etc. When you use a package manager, such as apt-get, dpkg, synaptic, etc to install the package, the files are put in their appropriate places by the package installation tool according to the instructions it finds in the package.deb file. You can then manually move the files or installed directories such as /opt/package-name to your USB drive, and create links in their original location back to their new location on the thumb drive. There are other methods as well.

If you install from source, most source packages have a configure script which normally allows you to tell it where to install the package or parts thereof. If you do that, then you will probably have to change your PATH and possibly LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variables so the system can find the executables and/or libraries.

So, clear as mud, right? :-)

[mjdodd]

Thanks to all , now I've got the homework to do!!