How do I install this on Rocky Linux 8?

[jmalmsten]

In short.

I am on Rocky Linux 8.

My head is bloody.

(Edit: I failed to notice that I didn’t specify what I’m trying to install and run.. it’s Audacity. I’m trying to use audacity)

I have tried the appimage, it won’t run.
I have tried the flatpac, it won’t run.
I have tried the software center in gnome, it installed a version 2, now it does have v3. But after install… it won’t run.
With all the attempts, I try to follow the cryptic install instructions. Most of the time failing because I can’t use apt or other such solutions.
I have thousands of tabs open from hundreds of google searches. Nothing seems to point towards any way forward.

And as usual… with everything Linux, it’s “works for me” or “git good”… but no hints as to what is making it so impossible to go ahead and just install and use a friggin app.

I may be sounding incomprehensible, but it is my genuine experience trying to get this to work. I feel like I’m trying to decipher the Necronomicon and the old Ones are just laughing at my futility.

If you are running the latest version on Rocky Linux 8… then… can you point me towards a comprehensible tutorial for how to achieve this seemingly impossible task? Because, even if it involves arcane rituals of ancient spirits, I’d try it.

[iwalker]

@jmalmsten

I have tried the appimage, it won’t run.
I have tried the flatpac, it won’t run.
I have tried the software center in gnome, it installed a version 2, now it does have v3. But after install… it won’t run.

You fail to mention what package you are trying to install and use.

@jmalmsten

If you are running the latest version on Rocky Linux 8… then… can you point me towards a comprehensible tutorial for how to achieve this seemingly impossible task?

Here’s Rocky documentation on how to install packages: Dnf Package Manager - Documentation

But until we know exactly what your problem is, what package, etc, kinda difficult to help.

[jlehtone]

As said above, we do not know this.

The only this that I do know is the self pointer of a C++ class. That would require C++ compiler, i.e. GCC. However, C++ does not have “v2” or “v3”, so you must be after some other this. Please tell.

[jmalmsten]

Sorry. I copied it from a post I made on the audacity forum and failed to add that crucial bit of info.

It’s audacity I’m trying to install and run.

[iwalker]

So, as audacity is in epel repository, you can do this:

dnf install epel-release
dnf install audacity

those commands need to be run as root, so use su or sudo su to get to root first. Sudo will work providing your user is in the wheel group. If it wasn’t added to wheel group during installation of Rocky, then just use su and use root password.

[jmalmsten]

ok,

I tried that. It says I already have Audacity installed. So I tried

sudo dnf remove audacity

that let me remove whatever was installed as audacity, it seems. But when I try to install. All I get is version 2.3.3-2el8. According to the Software app, the latest there is version 3.7.3

If I try to install with the Gnome Software App to get the 3.7.3 version. It seems to install… But when I try to run it… All I get is:

“Audacity” is not responding.

[iwalker]

Yes, because EPEL package Audacity version 2.3.3. If you want the EPEL team to build a newer version of Audacity, you can make a package request here: Requesting a new package in EPEL :: Fedora Docs

As for the version that comes from flatpak, that’s not official Rocky software, so it’s unsupported here anyway. You would have to report it to whoever wrote and published it in flatpak if it’s not working.

Until then, you can use the older version that is available in EPEL until either you or someone requests EPEL to build the newer version. Either that, or you can install Rocky 9 and use Audacity 3.1.3 from EPEL9. But again it’s still not 3.7.3. But at least better than 2.3.3.

The other alternative is building the latest version of Audacity yourself.

Incidently, Fedora 42 which I use on my laptop has Audacity 3.7.1.

[iwalker]

FYI - Audacity 3.1.3 running on my Rocky Linux 9 machine (installed using the dnf commands I gave earlier):

[jmalmsten]

As for the version that comes from flatpak, that’s not official Rocky software, so it’s unsupported here anyway. You would have to report it to whoever wrote and published it in flatpak if it’s not working.

Yeah, though, I asked over at the Audacity forum and they just directed me here.

Yes, because EPEL package Audacity version 2.3.3. If you want the EPEL team to build a newer version of Audacity, you can make a package request here: Requesting a new package in EPEL :: Fedora Docs

yeah, that might be an option. Though, since, the one on there is that old already, I guess there’s no real interest to update it.

Until then, you can use the older version that is available in EPEL until either you or someone requests EPEL to build the newer version. Either that, or you can install Rocky 9 and use Audacity 3.1.3 from EPEL9. But again it’s still not 3.7.3. But at least better than 2.3.3.

I would try that. But… The main thing I use this computer for is DaVinci Resolve and as far as I know, it’s not yet compatible with Rocky 9. All their documentation states it needs to be Rocky 8.

The other alternative is building the latest version of Audacity yourself.

I would try that… if I could find instructions as to how.

Incidently, Fedora 42 which I use on my laptop has Audacity 3.7.1.

I have linux Mint on my own laptop. I just thought it should be possible to get apps of the same or at least close to the same version on another distro.

As a new user of Linux (“wow, really, I don’t say”) I can understand how most people look at the whole ecosystem in utter bewilderment and return to the safety and standardization of Mac and Windows. But as my computer is not compatible with win11 and I don’t really like where they are going… and I have an unreasonalbe aversion to apple products, I am somewhat determined to try to make things work with an open source OS.

I have heard of people getting Resolve to work on other distro’s but I try to stick to Rocky Linux as it is the officially supported version by BMD.

[iwalker]

@jmalmsten

As a new user of Linux (“wow, really, I don’t say”) I can understand how most people look at the whole ecosystem in utter bewilderment and return to the safety and standardization of Mac and Windows

You have to remember thing like RHEL, Rocky, Alma are Enterprise Linux, so they are stable versions, but older packages. Debian is no different in this respect. Ubuntu can be slightly better, but even they lag behind in package versions on their LTS releases. Obviously it’s possible to use Fedora which has up-to-date packages, and this is comparable to running Debian Testing or even Debian Unstable/SID. Obviously, as you are using Davinci Resolve, you are stuck on that point. There are people here (who have already posted on the forums), and they have gotten Davinci Resolve working with Rocky 9. It all depends on if you have the patience to try it or not. Davinci themselves, seem to have their own build, but it seems to be Rocky 8.6. Of course once installed, it can be upgraded to Rocky 8.10, but even so, I’m surprised they haven’t made their own Rocky 9.x build - or perhaps they can’t be bothered? Who knows

Windows also is no different. I could try to run the latest Firefox on Windows XP, but it won’t now because they no longer make software for XP. Maybe a bit of an exaggeration, but soon it will be the same for Windows 10. Only old software and nothing new.

I could try using one of these Fedora Source RPMS: Overview - rpms/audacity - src.fedoraproject.org - it’s possible to use mock to build these, assuming all relevant dependencies can be resolved easily enough. It’s not for the faint-hearted though. I’ll see how easy or frustrating it is, but you may be better just sticking with what is available by default from EPEL.

Do you really need the latest Audacity? Is there something missing in the 2.3.3 version that you don’t have?

[jmalmsten]

Hey… Please do not waste too much time on this thread.

If it can’t be done, it can’t be done. I’ll accept it.

I should be the one trying these things, not you.

I have kind of set out to try to get the latest audacity to work as a challenge to myself to learn how to do things in Linux in general. I’m not loosing any money or paid time over it. Neither should you.

I mainly posted here to see if it was a solved problem already and I just weren’t looking under the right rocks. From what I can gather here is that I might be better off troubleshooting other things.

I’ll put this aside and try to solve another problem I have been having… changing the background image (yes… I only deal with the really big challenges )

[iwalker]

Actually the mock process doesn’t look too bad. Audacity 3.7.2 from Fedora src rpm won’t build - already tried that. Currently building Audacity 3.5.2 which has been going a while now, and at least hasn’t bombed out yet. Failing that, there is Audacity 3.4.2 that I can try after that.

There’s two commands to use in general, the first one installs the dependencies required by audacity to build it, and the second command builds audacity. I’ll post them shortly along with the links to the source rpms.

[iwalker]

OK, so first install mock - in this example my username is ian so you will need to change that for yours:

dnf install mock
gpasswd -a ian mock

you will now need to logout and log back in again for that to be active. Now we can start building audacity from the source rpm. First download the Audacity 3.5.1 source rpm from one of the two links:

Main page with links: audacity-3.5.1-4.fc41 | Build Info | koji
Direct download for source rpm: https://kojipkgs.fedoraproject.org//packages/audacity/3.5.1/4.fc41/src/audacity-3.5.1-4.fc41.src.rpm

that package now ends up in /home/ian/Downloads on my system. Now we can build it, as mentioned there are two stages, one to deal with dependencies, the second to build the package.

mock -r rocky+epel-8-x86_64 --installdeps audacity-3.5.1-4.fc41.src.rpm
mock -r rocky+epel-8-x86_64 audacity-3.5.1-4.fc41.src.rpm

I built in Rocky 9 but I’ve adjusted the commands to match your environment. Now if that does fail to build, you can try an older version of 3.4.2 from these links:

Main page with links: audacity-3.4.2-1.fc40 | Build Info | koji
Direct download for source rpm: https://kojipkgs.fedoraproject.org//packages/audacity/3.4.2/1.fc40/src/audacity-3.4.2-1.fc40.src.rpm

maybe 3.5.1 will build for Rocky 8, so worth a try. After it’s finished building, you will have an RPM, so now I did this:

cp /var/lib/mock/rocky+epel-9-x86_64/result/audacity-3.5.1-4.el9.x86_64.rpm /home/ian/Downloads

yours will be different because it will reference rocky+epel-8-x86_64 directory, and the audacity rpm will most likely be audacity-3.5.1-4.el9.x86_64.rpm so:

cp /var/lib/mock/rocky+epel-8-x86_64/result/audacity-3.5.1-4.el8.x86_64.rpm /home/ian/Downloads

and then after that you can install it:

dnf install -y /home/ian/Downloads/audacity-3.5.1-4.el8.x86_64.rpm

and then after that when you run Audacity it should look like my screenshots