Cannot install

[ineuw]

Downloaded the current master file, tried to install it, and it failed what am I missing?

ineuw@lmcde:/media/logiciels/geany/geany-master$ ./autogen.sh

Warning: I am going to run `configure' with no arguments.
If you wish to pass any to it, please specify them on the
./autogen.sh' command line.

Processing configure.ac
./autogen.sh: 33: autoreconf: not found

[ineuw]

Installed the two required apps autoreconf and autopoint and it terminated with the following messages:

autoreconf: running: aclocal -I m4
autoreconf: configure.ac: tracing
autoreconf: configure.ac: not using Libtool
autoreconf: configure.ac: not using Intltool
autoreconf: configure.ac: not using Gtkdoc
autoreconf: running: /usr/bin/autoconf
configure.ac:106: warning: AC_DISABLE_STATIC is m4_require'd but not m4_defun'd
m4/geany-plugins.m4:5: GEANY_CHECK_PLUGINS is expanded from...
configure.ac:106: the top level
configure.ac:106: warning: LT_INIT is m4_require'd but not m4_defun'd
m4/geany-plugins.m4:5: GEANY_CHECK_PLUGINS is expanded from...
configure.ac:106: the top level
configure:12873: error: possibly undefined macro: AC_DISABLE_STATIC
If this token and others are legitimate, please use m4_pattern_allow.
See the Autoconf documentation.
autoreconf: error: /usr/bin/autoconf failed with exit status: 1

At this point I haven't installed the plugins.

[b4n]

The README should be a good start I believe.

[ineuw]

@b4n if that worked, I would not have posted. I must solve this installation because I don't have another text editor installed and I am reliant on a versatile sophisticated text editor. Please don't bother to suggest another. I tried them ALL!!!

There are other installation issues which I won't mention here, NOT to confuse the issue even more. There doesn't seem to be a simple direct installation method for users with limited knowledge, like myself. I want to learn how to do a clean installation of v2.0. And, I am not keen on contacting developers directly.

ineuw@lmcde:/media/logiciels/geany/geany-master$ ./configure
configure: error: cannot find required auxiliary files: ar-lib config.guess config.sub > compile missing install-sh
ineuw@lmcde:/media/logiciels/geany/geany-master$

[rdipardo]

@ineuw

There doesn't seem to be a simple direct installation method for users with limited knowledge, like myself.

Here is a copy-and-paste-able installation script (assuming you don't care about the API documentation), suitable even for CI/CD deployments:

sudo apt update && \
sudo apt install --no-install-recommends \
    build-essential \
    autopoint \
    ccache \
    gettext \
    intltool \
    libtool \
    libgtk-3-dev
NOCONFIGURE=1 ./autogen.sh
mkdir -p _build && cd _build
../configure --prefix=/usr \
    --disable-html-docs \
    --disable-pdf-docs \
    --disable-api-docs \
    --disable-gtkdoc-header \
    --enable-binreloc=no
make -j4 && sudo make install && sudo ldconfig

[elextr]

@ineuw to be fair to us, you are not just installing, you are building and installing, and building is a development activity that assumes that you know enough to install the relevant tools, because its not the job of every project to teach the tools they use.

You have not specified what operating system you are trying to build on, but the script by @rdipardo looks like it will work on Debian like distros (untested) when run from the top level of the clone tree.

There was a PR to add the simplest build sequence to README, but it kept getting kibbitzed with "no it needs to do this", "should be out of tree", "its better to use the tools in this more complex way", etc etc so it was abandoned.

[ineuw]

@rdipardo, Thank you for the script. It went smoothly and all installation problems are solved, including the root version which I also use often. I also installed the plugins (2.0) and the themes in both.

@elextr I will post a separate reply later.

[ineuw]

@ineuw to be fair to us, you are not just installing, you are building and installing, and building is a development activity that assumes that you know enough to install the relevant tools, because its not the job of every project to teach the tools they use.

You have not specified what operating system you are trying to build on, but the script by @rdipardo looks like it will work on Debian like distros (untested) when run from the top level of the clone tree.

There was a PR to add the simplest build sequence to README, but it kept getting kibbitzed with "no it needs to do this", "should be out of tree", "its better to use the tools in this more complex way", etc etc so it was abandoned.

@elextr, I am not tuned in completely to the Linux culture where my expectations are wrong. My apologies.

I will return to post the results of installing Geany 2.1 in a Linux Mint Cinnamon 21.3 installation.

Previously, I was unable to install 2.0, unless I installed 1.38 from the Debian/Ubuntu/Linux Mint software repository.

[ineuw]

Installed Linux Mint 21.3 on a spare drive and after updating the iso installation, installed @rdipardo's script, and followed with the latest Geany installation script of 'Yage' (or 2.1.)

This may be a repeat installation because Linux Mint Cinnamon menu did not display the results of @rdipardo's installation script.

Then, installed geany-themes-1.24 and everything is working perfectly in a Debian installation of Linux Mint Cinnamon 21.3.

[elextr]

The desktop specification requires desktop managers (like Cinnamon) to search the list of directories in $XDG_DATA_DIRS for desktop files and use the first found only to add to menus, two applications with the same name cannot show in any desktop spec compliant menu. Geany installs to /usr/local by default which will not overwrite the standard LM install in /usr but the $XDG_DATA_DIRS should have /usr/local/share before /usr/share in the list, so it should be shown in the menu in, not the LM default. Check with echo $XDG_DATA_DIRS and check that geany.desktop appears in /usr/local/share/applications.

But you need to tell Cinnamon to re-scan those directories after an installation. The standard Geany install (and therefore the script) doesn't do that. This is because each desktop has a different way of doing it and the Geany install is desktop agnostic. But LM installs know about Cinnamon and will re-trigger it. So likely what happened when you installed something else was that Cinnamon was triggered to rescan and it found the install in /usr/local.

[ineuw]

Thanks for taking the time out to explain. It's much appreciated. There are numerous small issues with Cinnamon /building/rebuilding the menus, and I didn't realize that they are connected. Based on recent experience, an update to the problem is released very quickly. Quicker than I can compose a post.