Compiling Node.js from source is easy enough so here’s how.

Installing from a tarball

Node.js needs a few things to compile so make sure they are installed.

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sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install build-essential openssl libssl-dev pkg-config

Get the link for the latest tarball from the Source Code link on the Node.js homepage. Then download it and extract it.

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cd /usr/local/src
sudo mkdir node
cd node
sudo wget http://nodejs.org/dist/v0.6.6/node-v0.6.6.tar.gz
sudo tar -xzf node-v0.6.6.tar.gz

Now you can compile and install the binary. By default Node.js will be installed to /usr/local/bin/node and npm will be installed to /usr/local/bin/npm.

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cd node-v0.6.6/
sudo ./configure
sudo make
sudo make install

Upgrading via a tarball

To upgrade Node.js simply download the new tarball, extract and repeat the installation process.

Installing from Git

If you plan to upgrade each time a new release comes out you may find cloning the Git repository more convenient than downloading and extracting a tarball each time.

You will need Git and the dependencies to be installed first.

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sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install git-core build-essential openssl libssl-dev pkg-config

Using Git means that instead of downloading extracting a tarball you can just clone the repository and checkout the latest version. If you need to check the versions that are available run git tag.

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cd /usr/local/src
sudo git clone git://github.com/joyent/node.git
cd node
sudo git checkout v0.6.6

Now you can compile the binary as before

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sudo ./configure
sudo make
sudo make install

Upgrading via Git

To upgrade to a new release of Node.js first pull the latest source.

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cd /usr/local/src/node
sudo git checkout master
sudo git pull origin master

Then checkout the latest version where v.x.x.x is the version you want.

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sudo git checkout vx.x.x

Then follow the installation process as before

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sudo ./configure
sudo make
sudo make install

This will upgrade Node.js and overwrite the previous version.