How can I install the latest version of libmtp?

Question

In the latest version of the libmtp library there are fixes for my Android device so I would like to install the latest version I'm just not sure how! I would assume that this would pushed into the official repositories at some point, so the smart advice would probably be just to wait, but I would like to know how to do this myself if anyone could tell me.

I'm currently using Ubuntu 12.04 and am running libmtp-1.1.2, the latest version (libmtp-1.1.3) has recently been released and the tar.gz file is downloadable from this direct link: http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/libmtp/libmtp/1.1.3/libmtp-1.1.3.tar.gz

How do I install this? Thanks for any help.

Answer 1

First you need to get the file, extract the tarball and change to the folder. You can do this from a terminal:

wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/project/libmtp/libmtp/1.1.3/libmtp-1.1.3.tar.gz
tar zxf libmtp-1.1.3.tar.gz
cd libmtp-1.1.3

Second, build the source and install the binaries:

./configure
make
sudo make install

I'd be more inclined to use checkinstall - so not use the make install command, if so enter this commands instead:

./configure
make
sudo checkinstall

---

If you have not complied any software you might need some extra packages prior to starting.

sudo apt-get install build-essential checkinstall wget

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/CompilingEasyHowTo

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/CompilingSoftware

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/CheckInstall

Answer 2

Installing the ppa mentioned here will also allow you to update your libmtp:

How To Properly Mount Android 4.0+ Devices In Ubuntu Using Go-mtpfs ~ Web Upd8: Ubuntu / Linux blog

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:webupd8team/unstable
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install go-mtpfs

Optional, custom Unity Launcher for Go-mtpfs:

sudo apt-get install go-mtpfs-unity

But be careful: This PPA has other packages that you may not want to install.