E.1.1 Obtaining the Dependencies Automatically

On some systems you can obtain many of Octave’s build dependencies automatically. The commands for doing this vary by system. Similarly, the names of pre-compiled packages vary by system and do not always match exactly the names listed in Build Tools and External Packages.

You will usually need the development version of an external dependency so that you get the libraries and header files for building software, not just for running already compiled programs. These packages typically have names that end with the suffix -dev or -devel.

On systems with apt-get (Debian, Ubuntu, etc.), you may be able to install most of the tools and external packages using a command similar to

apt-get build-dep octave

The specific package name may be octave3.2 or octave3.4. The set of required tools and external dependencies does not change frequently, so it is not important that the version match exactly, but you should use the most recent one available.

On systems with yum (Fedora, Red Hat, etc.), you may be able to install most of the tools and external packages using a command similar to

yum-builddep octave

The yum-builddep utility is part of the yum-utils package.

For either type of system, the package name may include a version number. The set of required tools and external dependencies does not change frequently, so it is not important that the version exactly match the version you are installing, but you should use the most recent one available.