root access required when installing linux programs on web hosting servers

[Christopher Browne]

On 7/9/07, Teddy Mills <teddymills-Re5JQEeQqe8AvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org> wrote:
>
> When your on a web hosting service(choose any), you do not get the root
> password to the system.
> A large majority of linux programs(choose any) require root access when
> installing them. (some do not require root access)
>
> What are some workarounds for this common problem?

*REALITY* is that a large majority of Linux programs *in no way*
require root access to install them.  They merely assume so for the
sake of convenience, and/or assume that they will get managed by a
package manager system that is run with root access.

Typically, these applications use autoconf, and can be trivially
re-pointed to directories that you *do* have write access to via the
"--prefix" option.
-- 
http://linuxfinances.info/info/linuxdistributions.html
"...  memory leaks  are  quite acceptable  in  many applications  ..."
(Bjarne Stroustrup, The Design and Evolution of C++, page 220)
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