Generic install: ./configure make make install xinetd/xconv.pl < /etc/inetd.conf > /tmp/xinetd.conf Edit the /etc/xinetd.conf file to your liking. Options to configure: --prefix=/path to specify the directory prefix for installing xinetd. Check the README file for a description of the following options: --with-libwrap=[path] to specify that you would like libwrap compiled in. --with-loadavg Other options, such as what signals do what, where the default paths point for things like the config file and the debug dump file, default limitations, etc can all be configured in xinetd/config.h Please take a look at the config file before using it. A default config file is in xinetd/sample.conf. I can almost guarantee you'll have problems if you use the default config file. xconv.pl is a perl script that will convert your old inetd.conf file to xinetd.conf syntax. This does a pretty decent job on most inetd.conf files I've encountered.