You can run ranger without installing by simply starting the executable file ranger.py in the top directory of this package. To install ranger, follow this instructions: 0. Make sure you have a recent version of python, including the curses module, which is the case if this shell command prints no errors: python -c 'import curses' 1. Copy the file "ranger.py" into any of the directories in the PATH environment variable, for example to "/usr/bin/ranger" 2. Copy the directory "ranger" into one of the python module search paths, for example to "/usr/lib/python2.6/site-packages/ranger". Ensure that the path is listed by the command: python -c 'import sys; print("\n".join(sys.path))' 3. Optionally, you can activate an extra feature: When you exit ranger, the directory of the current shell can be changed to the last visited directory in ranger. To do so, add this alias to your shell rc file: alias rng="source ranger ranger" (Unfortunately this feature is shell dependent. It has been successfully tested with BASH only.)