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+<chapter>
+  <title>Installation</title>
+
+  <sect1>
+    <title>Prerequisites</title>
+
+    <para>
+      Nix uses Sleepycat's Berkeley DB and CWI's ATerm library.  However, these
+      are fetched automatically as part of the build process.
+    </para>
+
+    <para>
+      Other than that, you need a good C++ compiler.  GCC 2.95 does not appear
+      to work; please use GCC 3.x.
+    </para>
+  </sect1>
+
+  <sect1>
+    <title>Obtaining Nix</title>
+
+    <para>
+      Nix can be obtained from its <ulink
+	url='http://losser.st-lab.cs.uu.nl:12080/repos/trace/nix/trunk'>Subversion 
+	repository</ulink>.  For example, the following command will check out
+      the latest revision into a directory called <filename>nix</filename>:
+    </para>
+
+    <screen>
+      $ svn checkout http://losser.st-lab.cs.uu.nl:12080/repos/trace/nix/trunk
+      nix</screen>
+
+    <para>
+      Likewise, specific releases can be obtained from the <ulink
+	url='http://losser.st-lab.cs.uu.nl:12080/repos/trace/nix/tags'>tags
+	directory</ulink> of the repository.  If you don't have Subversion, you
+      can download a <ulink
+	url='http://losser.st-lab.cs.uu.nl:12080/dist/trace/'>compressed
+	tar-file</ulink> of the latest revision of the repository.
+    </para>
+
+  </sect1>
+
+  <sect1>
+    <title>Building Nix</title>
+
+    <para>
+      To build Nix, do the following:
+    </para>
+
+    <screen>
+      $ autoreconf -i $ ./configure <replaceable>options...</replaceable> $
+      make $ make install</screen>
+
+    <para>
+      Currently, the only useful switch for <command>configure</command> is
+      <option>--prefix=<replaceable>prefix</replaceable></option> to specify
+      where Nix is to be installed.  The default installation directory is
+      <filename>/nix</filename>.  You can change this to any location you like.
+      You should ensure that you have write permission to the installation
+      prefix. 
+    </para>
+
+    <warning>
+      <para>
+	It is advisable <emphasis>not</emphasis> to change the installation
+	prefix, since doing so will in all likelihood make it impossible to use
+	derivates built on other systems.
+      </para>
+    </warning>
+
+  </sect1>
+
+</chapter>
+
+<!--
+local variables:
+sgml-parent-document: ("book.xml" "chapter")
+end:
+-->