FWIW, once I realized that "./configure && make && sudo make install" was basically standard and worked the vast majority of the time, I really didn't mind it. In some ways I prefer it to platform-specific packages, which often lag development and include odd bugs and incompatibilities that don't bite you until run time.
It works fine for basic packages without many dependencies, but try a bigger package, where you have a few missing dependencies. Try installing those and you have more missing dependencies, repeat until you give up.
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FWIW, once I realized that "./configure && make && sudo make install" was basically standard and worked the vast majority of the time, I really didn't mind it. In some ways I prefer it to platform-specific packages, which often lag development and include odd bugs and incompatibilities that don't bite you until run time.
It works fine for basic packages without many dependencies, but try a bigger package, where you have a few missing dependencies. Try installing those and you have more missing dependencies, repeat until you give up.