On Mon, 12 Jan 2026 16:57:12 -0000 (UTC), Markus Robert Kessler wrote:

Meaning, do you let "make install" write directly to the filesystem
...

That?s usually how it?s done. All the well-behaved build scripts
default to putting things in /usr/local, where they don?t clobber
stuff handled by your system standard package manager.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 12/01/2026 06:36, Markus Robert Kessler wrote:

Well, these are the BUILD dependencies - are there RUNTIME requirements
also?

Generally (but I don't promise that it always works) if you have the dev
package installed in order to meet the build requirements you not need anything more at runtime.

There are non-dev packages that meet *only* the runtime requirements for people who don't need to meet the build requirements, but if you have
the dev packages you don't need those as well.

--
Cheers,
Daniel.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On Mon, 12 Jan 2026 12:45:29 +0000 Daniel James wrote:

On 12/01/2026 06:36, Markus Robert Kessler wrote:

Well, these are the BUILD dependencies - are there RUNTIME requirements
also?

Generally (but I don't promise that it always works) if you have the dev
package installed in order to meet the build requirements you not need
anything more at runtime.

There are non-dev packages that meet *only* the runtime requirements for
people who don't need to meet the build requirements, but if you have
the dev packages you don't need those as well.

B.t.w.,

how do you install all the files retrieved from compiling the tarball from scratch, if you want to avoid building a deb or rpm?

Meaning, do you let "make install" write directly to the filesystem, or do you pack all that files in one tar.gz and then use "alien" to transform it into a deb or rpm?

If you want to install to the system then of course "make install",
if you want to make a package or just a tar file that can be
unpacked to "/" on similar systems, DESTDIR is useful:

sudo make DESTDIR=/tmp/mailutils install-strip

That installs everything into equivalent directories under
/tmp/mailutils as when you do a "make install", with debugging info
stripped to avoid wasting space. You should still run it as root so
that the file permissions are set correctly. Then you can make a
package or tar archive from the contents of that directory for
installing to other systems running the same distro.

Note occasionally programs won't support "DESTDIR" and will then
install to "/" anyway, and also some won't understand
"install-strip" so you must use "install" instead, then run "strip"
on the binaries manually. But Mailutils supports both, as, it
seems, do all GNU projects.

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 12 Jan 2026 07:20:47 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Well I built GNU Mailutils 3.21 from source with all the functionality
you require and noted the following dependencies:

readline-dev, libunistring-dev, gnutls38-dev, tcp_wrappers-dev,
libltdl, libtool-dev, libgsasl-dev

At least libgsasl-dev probably isn't needed for your use since I only
added that to enable SMTP authentication using putmail. IMAP
authentication using movemail was working before that. Some others might
be surplus to requirements too.

Interesting, thank you!

Well, these are the BUILD dependencies - are there RUNTIME requirements also?

Sure, all of those with "-dev" removed, except libtool. You can
probably use whatever version of the gnutls package for your distro
is the latest.

readline, libunistring, gnutls, tcp_wrappers, libltdl, libgsasl

Although you can build it without some of those, such as libgsasl
as mentioned before. Of course exact package names will differ
between distros, especially with the "lib" prefixes.

"ldd `which movemail`" is a quick way to see all the libraries
used by the executable, however it will show additional libraries
used by the direct dependenies, without distinction. Another way
is using "readelf -d `which movemail` | grep NEEDED", which just
gives you the immediate dependencies, but then in this case you
get a bunch of "libmu_*" Mailutils libraries which then also need
to be checked with "ldd" or "readelf", and that gets confusing.
Also those tools won't show any libraries or executables that are
loaded after the program has started. Then you have to work out
which packages the libraries belong to, for which the method is
specific to your distro or package format.

Anyway in this case you can just go from the list I gave you above.

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 13 Jan 2026 08:01:52 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 12 Jan 2026 07:20:47 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Well I built GNU Mailutils 3.21 from source with all the functionality
you require and noted the following dependencies:

readline-dev, libunistring-dev, gnutls38-dev, tcp_wrappers-dev,
libltdl, libtool-dev, libgsasl-dev

At least libgsasl-dev probably isn't needed for your use since I only
added that to enable SMTP authentication using putmail. IMAP
authentication using movemail was working before that. Some others
might be surplus to requirements too.

Interesting, thank you!

Well, these are the BUILD dependencies - are there RUNTIME requirements
also?

Sure, all of those with "-dev" removed, except libtool. You can probably
use whatever version of the gnutls package for your distro is the
latest.

readline, libunistring, gnutls, tcp_wrappers, libltdl, libgsasl

Although you can build it without some of those, such as libgsasl as mentioned before. Of course exact package names will differ between
distros, especially with the "lib" prefixes.

"ldd `which movemail`" is a quick way to see all the libraries used by
the executable, however it will show additional libraries used by the
direct dependenies, without distinction. Another way is using "readelf
-d `which movemail` | grep NEEDED", which just gives you the immediate dependencies, but then in this case you get a bunch of "libmu_*"
Mailutils libraries which then also need to be checked with "ldd" or "readelf", and that gets confusing. Also those tools won't show any
libraries or executables that are loaded after the program has started.
Then you have to work out which packages the libraries belong to, for
which the method is specific to your distro or package format.

Anyway in this case you can just go from the list I gave you above.

Hi, regarding Mageia Linux I am working on, I get

needed: available in distro:

readline lib64readline-devel
libunistring lib64unistring-devel
gnutls lib64gnutls-devel
tcp_wrappers tcp_wrappers
(no devel, executables in /usr/sbin:
safe_finger; tcpd; tcpdchk; tcpdmatch; try-from)
libltdl lib64ltdl-devel
libgsasl lib64gsasl-devel

So, except "tcp_wrappers", the package seems to be builable?

Thanks a lot!


--
Please reply to group only.
For private email please use http://www.dipl-ing-kessler.de/email.htm

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 13 Jan 2026 08:01:52 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 12 Jan 2026 07:20:47 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Well I built GNU Mailutils 3.21 from source with all the functionality >>>> you require and noted the following dependencies:

readline-dev, libunistring-dev, gnutls38-dev, tcp_wrappers-dev,
libltdl, libtool-dev, libgsasl-dev

[snip]

Hi, regarding Mageia Linux I am working on, I get

needed: available in distro:

readline lib64readline-devel
libunistring lib64unistring-devel
gnutls lib64gnutls-devel
tcp_wrappers tcp_wrappers
(no devel, executables in /usr/sbin:
safe_finger; tcpd; tcpdchk; tcpdmatch; try-from)
libltdl lib64ltdl-devel
libgsasl lib64gsasl-devel

So, except "tcp_wrappers", the package seems to be builable?

Yep, and tcp_wrappers looks to be optional, so you can probably
ignore that:

"The tcp-wrappers statements provides an alternative way to control
accesses to the resources served by GNU Mailutils. This statement
is enabled if Mailutils is compiled with TCP wrappers library
libwrap." https://www.mailutils.org/manual/html_node/tcp_002dwrappers-statement.html

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 16 Jan 2026 08:19:25 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 13 Jan 2026 08:01:52 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 12 Jan 2026 07:20:47 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Well I built GNU Mailutils 3.21 from source with all the
functionality you require and noted the following dependencies:

readline-dev, libunistring-dev, gnutls38-dev, tcp_wrappers-dev,
libltdl, libtool-dev, libgsasl-dev

[snip]

Hi, regarding Mageia Linux I am working on, I get

needed: available in distro:

readline lib64readline-devel libunistring
lib64unistring-devel gnutls lib64gnutls-devel
tcp_wrappers tcp_wrappers
(no devel, executables in /usr/sbin: safe_finger;
tcpd; tcpdchk; tcpdmatch; try-from)
libltdl lib64ltdl-devel libgsasl
lib64gsasl-devel

So, except "tcp_wrappers", the package seems to be builable?

Yep, and tcp_wrappers looks to be optional, so you can probably ignore
that:

"The tcp-wrappers statements provides an alternative way to control
accesses to the resources served by GNU Mailutils. This statement is
enabled if Mailutils is compiled with TCP wrappers library libwrap." https://www.mailutils.org/manual/html_node/tcp_002dwrappers-

statement.html

OK, thanks. I see that
lib64wrap-devel and libwrap-devel
are there. Do you think it is sufficient to just install one of them as dependency?


--
Please reply to group only.
For private email please use http://www.dipl-ing-kessler.de/email.htm

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 16 Jan 2026 08:19:25 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

So, except "tcp_wrappers", the package seems to be builable?

Yep, and tcp_wrappers looks to be optional, so you can probably ignore
that:

"The tcp-wrappers statements provides an alternative way to control
accesses to the resources served by GNU Mailutils. This statement is
enabled if Mailutils is compiled with TCP wrappers library libwrap."
https://www.mailutils.org/manual/html_node/tcp_002dwrappers-

statement.html

OK, thanks. I see that
lib64wrap-devel and libwrap-devel
are there. Do you think it is sufficient to just install one of them as dependency?

Probably the lib64 one. The configure script shows the features
enabled like I posted before. So if it's found tcp_wrappers/libwrap
then you'll get the same as me:

"Use TCP wrappers .............. yes"

If not:

"Use TCP wrappers .............. no"

Either way I expect it'll do everything you need, since I think
it's just for the IMAP and POP servers that are also part of
Mailutils.

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> writes:

And I can confirm that compiling from scratch is not as easy as it looked like. I tried to create a package for Mageia, based on the original
tarball, but there are plenty of dependencies not visible during configure/make/makeinstall. It compiled and built, but the result was not funtional. Creating a new rpm out of that failed as well.

True, building can get hairy. I recently built MEGAcmd (sync tool for
mega.nz) for arm64 on my Pi (CM3+ which is the equivalent of a 3B+, so
quad core and 1 GB of RAM). Should be easy? But their whatsit build
thingy uses architecture based rules but didn't have a rule for
arm64. My fumbling with it went nowhere at first but I then managed to
somehow inelegantly force it to do arm64. Also they've gone this silly OpenEmbedded kind of way that they want to download the source for and
build all dependencies for it. But that part actually worked out of the
box as the deps were much smaller than their actual code. Best part, all
the deps used other build systems that didn't need fiddling with.

Last but not least, 1 GB of RAM is a piddly amount these days. I added 2
GB of swap to get this to compile since 1 GB wasn't enough.

Setting up a VM or cross compilation for one app didn't feel like worth
doing.

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Sun, 18 Jan 2026 15:46:03 -0000 (UTC) Markus Robert Kessler wrote:

On 16 Jan 2026 11:57:08 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 16 Jan 2026 08:19:25 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

So, except "tcp_wrappers", the package seems to be builable?

Yep, and tcp_wrappers looks to be optional, so you can probably
ignore that:

"The tcp-wrappers statements provides an alternative way to control
accesses to the resources served by GNU Mailutils. This statement is
enabled if Mailutils is compiled with TCP wrappers library libwrap."
https://www.mailutils.org/manual/html_node/tcp_002dwrappers-

statement.html

OK, thanks. I see that lib64wrap-devel and libwrap-devel are there. Do
you think it is sufficient to just install one of them as dependency?

Probably the lib64 one. The configure script shows the features enabled
like I posted before. So if it's found tcp_wrappers/libwrap then you'll
get the same as me:

"Use TCP wrappers .............. yes"

If not:

"Use TCP wrappers .............. no"

Either way I expect it'll do everything you need, since I think it's
just for the IMAP and POP servers that are also part of Mailutils.

Hi there,

after a 'make install' to some DESTDIR, I took the created 'usr' dir,
chown-ed everything to root:root and verified that the rights are correct.

Then I created a tar.gz archive out of this 'usr' dir.

From this I took alien to convert to rpm:
alien --target=`arch` -r gnu-mailutils-3.21.tar.gz


All worked, but when trying to install the rpm I get

[1040 root@mga9x64-lb1 /tmp]# rpm -i gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64.rpm
error: Failed dependencies:
devel(libgnutls(64bit)) is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
devel(libgsasl(64bit)) is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
devel(libltdl(64bit)) is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
libgsasl.so.7()(64bit) is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
libgsasl.so.7(LIBGSASL_1.1)(64bit) is needed by gnu- mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64


This is strange because './configure' said

*******************************************************************
GNU Mailutils configured with the following settings:

Default mailbox scheme ........ mbox
Use PAM ....................... no
Use -ltdl ..................... yes
Use DBM ....................... no
Use GNU TLS ................... yes
Use GSASL ..................... yes
Use GSSAPI .................... yes
Use TCP wrappers .............. yes
Pthread support ............... yes
Readline support .............. yes
Libunistring support .......... yes
MySQL support ................. no
PostgreSQL support ............ no
LDAP support .................. no
Radius support ................ no
Support for virtual domains ... yes

IPv6 support .................. yes

Interfaces:

Guile ......................... no
C++ ........................... no
Python ........................ yes

Mailbox formats:

IMAP .......................... yes
POP ........................... yes
MH ............................ yes
maildir ....................... yes
dotmail ....................... yes

Mailers:

SMTP .......................... yes
Sendmail ...................... yes

Utilities to build:

Servers ....................... pop3d imap4d comsat mda lmtpd
Clients ....................... putmail frm mail sieve messages readmsg dotlock movemail mimeview decodemail mh

*******************************************************************

The 3 devel-s withing the 'rpm -i' error alert were installed as devel,
and the 2 gsasl-s, not sure, but maybe they are runtime requirements.

Any idea what's still missing here?

Thank you!

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> writes:

Wrappers (64bit) is ok, and all services like pop and imap are building. Somehow strange, that it complains about 'C++:no', though gcc is there.

You have probably installed gcc but not g++.

--
https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> writes:

On Sun, 18 Jan 2026 16:06:48 +0000 Richard Kettlewell wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> writes:

Wrappers (64bit) is ok, and all services like pop and imap are
building.
Somehow strange, that it complains about 'C++:no', though gcc is there.

You have probably installed gcc but not g++.

On Raspbian there is a package 'g++' to cover the c++ things.

While, on Mageia I cannot find such package. Instead there is 'gcc-c++', which claims 'This package adds C++ support to the GNU C compiler'.
I have installed 'gcc-c++', so, maybe GNU-mailutil's './configure' is
being confused here?

On a closer look it looks like that bit of output depends on whether you
use an --enable-cxx option. I?ve no idea what it?s for but unless it corresponds to something you know you want, I?d ignore it.

--
https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Sun, 18 Jan 2026 18:44:37 -0000 (UTC), Markus Robert Kessler wrote:

From this I took alien to convert to rpm:

That seems a very roundabout process. On Debian, after doing ?apt-get
source? to get the package source and making the desired changes,
rebuilding the .deb file is as easy as using the ?debuild? command.

Is there not something directly equivalent for your rpm-based distro?


--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

after a 'make install' to some DESTDIR, I took the created 'usr' dir, chown-ed everything to root:root and verified that the rights are correct.

Then I created a tar.gz archive out of this 'usr' dir.

From this I took alien to convert to rpm:
alien --target=`arch` -r gnu-mailutils-3.21.tar.gz

All worked, but when trying to install the rpm I get

[1040 root@mga9x64-lb1 /tmp]# rpm -i gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64.rpm
error: Failed dependencies:
devel(libgnutls(64bit)) is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
devel(libgsasl(64bit)) is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
devel(libltdl(64bit)) is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
libgsasl.so.7()(64bit) is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
libgsasl.so.7(LIBGSASL_1.1)(64bit) is needed by gnu- mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64

x86_64? This is in the Raspberry Pi Group. Did you pick the wrong
newsgroup to discuss this or are you trying to complile on a PC
but run Mailutils on a RPi? That's possible, but difficult, and
for this you'd be much better compiling Mailutils on the RPi
instead.

This is strange because './configure' said

The configure script worked if you got the mailutils binaries
built, which it sounds like you did (otherwise DESTDIR will be
empty). I've never used "alien" and don't know how it goes about
making packages, but it looks like something must be going wrong
there. If you're trying to install to RPi (ARM) a package built
for x86_64, then that's definitely what's going wrong.

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Mon, 19 Jan 2026 16:19:41 -0000 (UTC), Markus Robert Kessler wrote:

On debian for intel, there is version 3.20 - but it is not complete.
imap4d and pop3d are missing and other stuff. Just left away.

IMAP and POP support is in separate packages -- typical Debian
philosophy, you install just the ones you need:

$ apt-cache search -n mailutils
libmailutils-dev - development files for GNU mailutils
libmailutils9t64 - GNU Mail abstraction library
mailutils - GNU mailutils utilities for handling mail
mailutils-common - common files for GNU mailutils
mailutils-comsatd - GNU mailutils-based comsatd daemon
mailutils-doc - documentation files for GNU mailutils
mailutils-guile - GNU mailutils Guile interpreter and modules
mailutils-imap4d - GNU mailutils-based IMAP4 Daemon
mailutils-mda - GNU mailutils utilities for handling mail -- MDA
mailutils-mh - GNU mailutils-based MH utilities
mailutils-pop3d - GNU mailutils-based POP3 Daemon
python3-mailutils - GNU Mail abstraction library (Python3 interface)

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

On 19 Jan 2026 07:23:39 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

[1040 root@mga9x64-lb1 /tmp]# rpm -i gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64.rpm
error: Failed dependencies:
devel(libgnutls(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 devel(libgsasl(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 devel(libltdl(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 libgsasl.so.7()(64bit) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 libgsasl.so.7(LIBGSASL_1.1)(64bit)
is needed by gnu-
mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64

x86_64? This is in the Raspberry Pi Group. Did you pick the wrong
newsgroup to discuss this or are you trying to complile on a PC but run
Mailutils on a RPi? That's possible, but difficult, and for this you'd
be much better compiling Mailutils on the RPi instead.

This is strange because './configure' said

The configure script worked if you got the mailutils binaries built,
which it sounds like you did (otherwise DESTDIR will be empty). I've
never used "alien" and don't know how it goes about making packages, but
it looks like something must be going wrong there. If you're trying to
install to RPi (ARM) a package built for x86_64, then that's definitely
what's going wrong.

Hello, thanks! And, no, I did not click onto the wrong group.
Instead, the desperate situation is like that:

On latest raspbian, debian for ARM, there is only an ancient version 3.10. Good to play with, but that's all.

On debian for intel, there is version 3.20 - but it is not complete.
imap4d and pop3d are missing and other stuff. Just left away.

On Redhat / Mageia for intel, which I am also running, there is even no
such package like GNU mailutils at all.

Just note that nothing you do "on intel" will just work on ARM. If
you want Mailutils on both ARM and "intel", you need to build it
twice. If you just want it on one ARM system, then repeat
everything on the ARM system and just do "sudo make install"
without the DESTDIR and package stuff which only matters if you
want to install easily to other RPis (and even then I'd personally
just make a tarball and unpack that to "/" after installing the
dependencies manually, rather than making an RPM package).

Besides this:

Looking at the 'Failed dependencies' message above, this looks as if the devel packages have to be linked statically, otherwise movemail and others cannot access them and are asking for them again.

Static linking should avoid any dependency problem when it's built
on ARM. Building on x86_64 "intel", nothing will work on ARM unless
you install and use a cross-compiling environment. But don't do
that unless you're desperate for a challenge, just build on ARM in
the first place, since any RPi is capable of compiling Mailutils.

If you want the same build to run on Debian and "Redhat / Mageia",
then static linking can achieve that more reliably. Note that it
will prevent security updates to gnutls being applied when running
Mailutils with encrypted connections, until you rebuild the static
binary. You should be able to use the Debian x86_64 Mailutils
packages at least, so you probably don't need to try running the
Mageia build on there. Just compile and install Mailutils normally
on "Redhat / Mageia for intel" and "debian for ARM" as two separate
processes.

--
__ __
#_ < |\| |< _#

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On 19 Jan 2026 07:23:39 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

after a 'make install' to some DESTDIR, I took the created 'usr' dir,
chown-ed everything to root:root and verified that the rights are
correct.

Then I created a tar.gz archive out of this 'usr' dir.

From this I took alien to convert to rpm:
alien --target=`arch` -r gnu-mailutils-3.21.tar.gz


All worked, but when trying to install the rpm I get

[1040 root@mga9x64-lb1 /tmp]# rpm -i gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64.rpm
error: Failed dependencies:
devel(libgnutls(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 devel(libgsasl(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 devel(libltdl(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 libgsasl.so.7()(64bit) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 libgsasl.so.7(LIBGSASL_1.1)(64bit)
is needed by gnu-
mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64

x86_64? This is in the Raspberry Pi Group. Did you pick the wrong
newsgroup to discuss this or are you trying to complile on a PC but run Mailutils on a RPi? That's possible, but difficult, and for this you'd
be much better compiling Mailutils on the RPi instead.

This is strange because './configure' said

The configure script worked if you got the mailutils binaries built,
which it sounds like you did (otherwise DESTDIR will be empty). I've
never used "alien" and don't know how it goes about making packages, but
it looks like something must be going wrong there. If you're trying to install to RPi (ARM) a package built for x86_64, then that's definitely what's going wrong.

Hello, thanks! And, no, I did not click onto the wrong group.
Instead, the desperate situation is like that:

On latest raspbian, debian for ARM, there is only an ancient version 3.10. Good to play with, but that's all.

On debian for intel, there is version 3.20 - but it is not complete.
imap4d and pop3d are missing and other stuff. Just left away.

On Redhat / Mageia for intel, which I am also running, there is even no
such package like GNU mailutils at all.

So, no big difference, in which group to ask. No 'one group for all'.
Whatever you want to achieve, you have to try yourself.

__But, as far as I see, here are the experts.__

So, I take this chance to say thank you for all the hints I already got.


Besides this:

Looking at the 'Failed dependencies' message above, this looks as if the
devel packages have to be linked statically, otherwise movemail and others cannot access them and are asking for them again.
Do you dispose this to be so?

Thank you!

Best regards,

Markus


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Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> writes:

On 19 Jan 2026 07:23:39 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

after a 'make install' to some DESTDIR, I took the created 'usr' dir,
chown-ed everything to root:root and verified that the rights are
correct.

Then I created a tar.gz archive out of this 'usr' dir.

From this I took alien to convert to rpm:
alien --target=`arch` -r gnu-mailutils-3.21.tar.gz


All worked, but when trying to install the rpm I get

[1040 root@mga9x64-lb1 /tmp]# rpm -i gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64.rpm
error: Failed dependencies:
devel(libgnutls(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 devel(libgsasl(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 devel(libltdl(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 libgsasl.so.7()(64bit) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 libgsasl.so.7(LIBGSASL_1.1)(64bit)
is needed by gnu-
mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64

[...]

Looking at the 'Failed dependencies' message above, this looks as if
the devel packages have to be linked statically, otherwise movemail
and others cannot access them and are asking for them again. Do you
dispose this to be so?

I don?t know RPM well but for most packaging systems, if it says you?re
missing a dependency then it just means you need to install the package containing that dependency.

Certainly within Debian the norm is for executables to be dynamically
linked and the package containing then to have a dependency on the
runtime packages for each shared library. Static executables are rare at
best.

In your case, I thought you were trying to do a local build and install.
So I don?t see why RPM is involved at all.

--
https://www.greenend.org.uk/rjk/

--- PyGate Linux v1.5.2
* Origin: Dragon's Lair, PyGate NNTP<>Fido Gate (3:633/10)

On Tue, 20 Jan 2026 08:47:29 +0000 Richard Kettlewell wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> writes:

On 19 Jan 2026 07:23:39 +1000 Computer Nerd Kev wrote:

Markus Robert Kessler <no_reply@dipl-ing-kessler.de> wrote:

after a 'make install' to some DESTDIR, I took the created 'usr' dir,
chown-ed everything to root:root and verified that the rights are
correct.

Then I created a tar.gz archive out of this 'usr' dir.

From this I took alien to convert to rpm:
alien --target=`arch` -r gnu-mailutils-3.21.tar.gz


All worked, but when trying to install the rpm I get

[1040 root@mga9x64-lb1 /tmp]# rpm -i gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64.rpm
error: Failed dependencies:
devel(libgnutls(64bit)) is needed by
gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 devel(libgsasl(64bit)) is needed
by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 devel(libltdl(64bit)) is
needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64 libgsasl.so.7()(64bit)
is needed by gnu-mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64
libgsasl.so.7(LIBGSASL_1.1)(64bit) is needed by gnu-
mailutils-3.21-2.x86_64

[...]

Looking at the 'Failed dependencies' message above, this looks as if
the devel packages have to be linked statically, otherwise movemail and
others cannot access them and are asking for them again. Do you
dispose this to be so?

I don?t know RPM well but for most packaging systems, if it says you?re missing a dependency then it just means you need to install the package containing that dependency.

Certainly within Debian the norm is for executables to be dynamically
linked and the package containing then to have a dependency on the
runtime packages for each shared library. Static executables are rare at best.

In your case, I thought you were trying to do a local build and install.
So I don?t see why RPM is involved at all.

By exporting to some DESTDIR, then create a tar.gz / slackware install archive, and then convert this into a deb or rpm with the help of alien conversion tool, you have full control over the location of the files
(derived from make install), and this guarantees that nothing is
overwritten by accident. Also, every install is tracked.

Meaning, same as make install directly, but with full control over it

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