Where to put program in linux file system

Question

I have downloaded DavMail and its currently living and running from my /home/user/Downloads/DavMail

in this folder is

davmail.jar
davmail.log
davmail.sh    
Lib/

I run the davmail.sh file which looks like this

BASE=`dirname $0`
for i in $BASE/lib/*; do export CLASSPATH=$CLASSPATH:$i; done
java -cp $BASE/davmail.jar:$CLASSPATH davmail.DavGateway $1

I need to put davmail in a better location than downloads but am unsure where to put it, Im guessing if I seperate some of the files/folders such as lib ill have to modify the davmail.sh file.

wheres the best location to keep this or should it remain in my home folder, I was going to put this in

/usr/local/bin 
/usr/local/lib

But the jar count as a binary? the .sh certainly wouldnt.

Answer 1

For large packages like that you can put it in /opt/DavMail. Then put the startup script either in /opt/bin or /usr/local/bin.

You have have to adjust it to run the rest from /opt/DavMail.

Answer 2

First of all, whenever possible, use the package manager of your linux distribution. Otherwise you'll loose track of installed programs sooner or later and have garbaged system.

Different distros have different default paths where they install software (via their package managers). If you are sure you cannot obtain the software in your system's native way, then at least stay away from the paths where your distro installs standard software.

Usually, /opt/ or /usr/local/* can be safe - but you'd better check whether you have programs in there. Another option can be ~/bin/ or, as a last resort, an arbitrary special directory like /myprogs/.