introduction python' mailing list once the missing packages are installedrun /configure and make again after successfully makingyou could run make test to see that everything is okayalthough this is not necessary and can take many minutes to complete if you used --prefix to do local installationjust run make install for python if you installed intosay~/local/python then by adding the ~/local/python /bin directory to your pathyou will be able to run python using python and idle using idle alternativelyif you already have local directory for executables that is already in your path (such as ~/bin)you might prefer to add soft links instead of changing the path for exampleif you keep executables in ~/bin and you installed python in ~/local/python you could create suitable links by executing ln - ~/local/python /bin/python ~/bin/python and ~/local/python /bin/idle ~/bin/idle for this book we did local install and added soft links on linux and mac os exactly as described here--and on windows we used the binary installer if you did not use --prefix and have root accesslog in as root and do make install on sudo-based systems like ubuntudo sudo make install if python is on the system/usr/bin/python won' be changedand python will be available as python (or python depending on the version installedand from python in additionas python python ' idle is installed as idleso if access to python ' idle is still required the old idle will need to be renamed--for exampleto /usr/bin/idle --before doing the install python installs idle as idle and so does not conflict with python ' idle acknowledgments would first like to acknowledge with thanks the feedback have received from readers of the first editionwho gave correctionsor made suggestionsor both my next acknowledgments are of the book' technical reviewersstarting with jasmin blanchettea computer scientistprogrammerand writer with whom have cowritten two ++/qt books jasmin' involvement with planning and his suggestions and criticisms regarding all the examplesas well as his careful readinghave immensely improved the quality of this book georg brandl is leading python developer and documentor responsible for creating python' new documentation tool chain georg spotted many subtle mistakes and very patiently and persistently explained them until they were understood and corrected he also made many improvements to the examples