tar.gz vs. rpm

[jrk8533]

I am running RH 7.1 and I was wondering which would be better. Installing tar.gz files or rpms. I have been using rpms because I like opening up kpackage or gnorpm and seeing the different programs I have installed and the version numbers of each. However, I am starting to get frustrated with dependency hell.

[asymblor]

I had similar probs with rpm's & rht, don't get me wrong 95% of rpm install just fine but theres always a few programs most recently for me Kvirc that requested .so's that were program specific and nobody seemed to know where to get em and I didnt really want to bother the developers until I tried everything. So I d/l'ed the tar.gz followed the instructions and everything worked fine.

However being the lazy person I am I usually go for the RPM's first but in reality the power of Linux lies in its flexibility and configurability in which case getting the tar.gz gives you the source code and all necessary configuration files for you to tweak or change.

asymblor

[jrk8533]

One of the main reasons I posted this question is when I installed KDE 2.2. To make a long story short, I no longer have KDE at all I can't even long into KDE. So I am having to go back and try to fix it. I'm hoping that if I uninstall all of the rpm's I can use the tar.gz files to install it correctly.