Appendix D. Installing from Source
Generally speaking, you should avoid installing from source. Many operating systems provide package managers that will allow you to download and install CouchDB with a single command. These package managers usually take care of setting things up correctly, handling security, and making sure that the CouchDB database is started and stopped correctly by your system. The first few appendixes showed you how to install CouchDB packages for Unix-like, Mac OS X, and Windows operating systems. If you are unable to follow those instructions, or you need to install by hand for other reasons, this chapter is for you.
Dependencies
To build and install CouchDB, you will need to install a collection of other software that CouchDB depends on. Without this software properly installed on your system, CouchDB will refuse to work. You’ll need to download and install the following:
It is recommended that you install Erlang OTP R12B-5 or above if possible.
Each of these software packages should provide custom installation instructions, either on the website or in the archive you download. If you’re lucky, however, you may be able to use a package manager to install these dependencies.
Debian-Based (Including Ubuntu) Systems
You can install the dependencies by running:
apt-get install build-essential erlang libicu-dev libmozjs-dev libcurl4-openssl-dev
If you get an error about any of these ...