This post was originally published on go2linux.org, a Linux blog I ran from 2007 to 2011. The domain is no longer mine, but I am the original author. I am republishing it here on garron.me with corrections and improvements.

Introduction

If you plan to use your computer to develop software, or simply install software from sources, you will need some basic tools like:

  • gcc
  • c++
  • make
  • others

These tools are installed in different ways, depending your Linux distribution, here I will cover Fedora, Debian and derivatives (like Ubuntu or Mint) and Arch Linux.

Fedora

sudo yum update

sudo yum groupinstall "Development Tools" "Legacy Software Development"

Debian / Ubuntu / Debian derivatives

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install build-essential

Arch Linux

sudo pacman -Sy base-devel

You now have the needed tools to compile software in your Linux box.

You can verify the version of packages you have with:

gcc -v

and

make -v

Happy developing