HOWTO install PerCobol on Ubuntu 8.04

[Coldhearth]

Hey there, I need to use Legacy PerCobol for a course of COBOL in my school.
I have a Macbook Pro but the program isn't available for Mac OSX...
I also have Ubuntu 8.04 installed on another partition and the program is available for Linux so my question is how to install this because my attempts are usesless untill now.
I'm still a noob in Linux so that might be the reason why I can't figure it out
Can you guys help me out a bit?

[v0id]

You need to give us more information about it. Personally, I don't want to register just in order to download it in order to find out how you can install it in order to tell you how to do it. A good start would be to list the files the package you download contains.

Another thing you could consider was using another compiler, unless PerCobol is required for your course. I have heard OpenCOBOL should be excellent, supporting both the 85- and 02-standards, including some non-standard features. I haven't used it myself though, but you may want to give it a go. It's easy to install, now when you have Ubuntu (and I suppose, a working internet-connection) ...

$ sudo apt-get install open-cobol

And if you want to mix it with C/C++, or make some development on it yourself, you need these ...

$ sudo apt-get install libcob1
$ sudo apt-get install libcob1-dev

Whereas the first of the packages, libcob1, probably will be included, when you're downloading OpenCOBOL itself.

Good luck!

[Coldhearth]

Well maybe the first problem is that I have downloaded the wrong version...
Because I doubted... when you get on the download page of PerCobol you can choose between:
- linux 8 and below
- linux 9 and above
I use Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy so first of all what version do I need to download?

EDIT:
I downloaded the 9 or above version but all I get is a .bin file...
If I click on this it doesn't do anything except for giving an error:
"there is no application installed for this type of file"

[v0id]

That sounds odd - and I can't really help you further.

Did you consider OpenCOBOL?

[Coldhearth]

I think I'll try it this night now I have to go practice in my band thx for the help thusfar