How to install updates For Linux

[dpalmer]

Kinda new to Linux and have FreeFileSync installed (I don't remember how I did it), but can't update to latest version.
I did download the Ubuntu file and unarchive it but don't know what to do from there.
Any help would be greatly appreciated. ;)

[bgstack15]

The Ubuntu tarball (for version 9.7 at least) contains a single directory, FreeFileSync. Inside that directory are the files for the application. The binary (executable) is the FreeFileSync file that is approximately 60MB in size. You can run this file from wherever you extracted the tarball.

If you want to make it possible to run FreeFileSync from directory on the command line, you can make a symbolic link in the /usr/bin directory, which is normally one of the first directories listed in the $PATH variable (which is is the list of directories checked for executable commands). You can make a symlink in the /usr/bin directory to your file like so:

ln -s /path/to/your/FreeFileSync /usr/bin/FreeFileSync


On Ubuntu, you probably will need to run that command with sudo. Alternatively, if you want that command easily available to just your user, you can make a symlink in your ~/bin directory (that's your $HOME/bin directory, i.e., probably /home/dpalmer/bin) like so:

mkdir -p ~/bin
ln -s /path/to/your/FreeFileSync ~/bin/FreeFileSync


Or better yet, you could simply move the file to /usr/bin, which is the default location for most user-run binaries in GNU/Linux systems:

sudo mv /path/to/your/FreeFileSync /usr/bin/FreeFileSync


If you wish to have a "shortcut" in your desktop environment's application menu, the easiest way to do that is to make a .desktop file in one of these locations:

/usr/share/applications
~/.local/share/applications

You will need to use a text editor to make a file, say, freefilesync.desktop with the following contents:

[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
Name=FreeFileSync
GenericName=File synchronization
Comment=File sync tool
Keywords=synchronization;
Exec=/usr/bin/FreeFileSync %f
Terminal=false
X-MultipleArgs=false
Type=Application
Icon=freefilesync
Categories=Utility;FileTools;
StartupNotify=true


An XDG-compliant desktop environment (GNOME, Unity, KDE, LXDE, MATE, Cinnamon, and pretty much every desktop environment you probably have heard of) should pick up the new file and show you the FreeFileSync program in the menu. About the icon file, I probably saved the icon from the website as a .png or .jpg and put it in my theme's /usr/share/icons/ directory, but that's a deeper topic for another post.

[dpalmer]

Thanks for the reply, but I don't see a file that size.
Here is a screen shot of the files I see after using Archive Manager on the downloaded tar file.

Screenshot at 2018-01-20 18-43-00.png (121.79 KiB) Viewed 2695 times

This is from the link "Download FreeFileSync 9.7 Ubuntu 17.10 64-bit"
Any help is appreciated.

[bgstack15]

The file to execute is the 8.3MB FreeFileSync. I guess I've been compiling it all wrong (with debug symbols?). If your file manager works like so: double-clicking on FreeFileSync should execute or ask you to execute it. Make sure it's the program, but I'm confident it will be.
Use that file in the .desktop file and you should be OK.

[dpalmer]

The file to execute is the 8.3MB FreeFileSync. I guess I've been compiling it all wrong (with debug symbols?). If your file manager works like so: double-clicking on FreeFileSync should execute or ask you to execute it. Make sure it's the program, but I'm confident it will be.
Use that file in the .desktop file and you should be OK.

Thanks for the replay but that doesn't work. I get this message box

Screenshot at 2018-01-22 21-28-17.png (16.07 KiB) Viewed 2671 times