A problem compiling Octave

[Benjamin Martin Bly]

(NOTE: I am sending this to the Octave help list which I do not receive so
if you could CC me directly (address@hidden) in any replies, I
would appreciate it!) 

Can somebody throw me a lifejacket? :-)

I'm using LINUX (Red Hat 5.2) and I tried to configure octave for
installation but it seemed to want g77.  I got a binary of gcc that
included g77 but now it cannot create executables for some other reason.
Here is what it says:

[root octave-2.0.13]# ./configure i386
loading cache ./config.cache
checking host system type... i386-pc-none
defining man1dir to be $(mandir)/man1
defining man1ext to be .1
defining infofile to be $(infodir)/octave.info
defining octincludedir to be $(includedir)/octave-$(version)
defining fcnfiledir to be $(datadir)/octave/$(version)/m
defining localfcnfiledir to be $(datadir)/octave/site/m
defining localfcnfilepath to be $(localfcnfiledir)//
defining octlibdir to be $(libdir)/octave-$(version)
defining archlibdir to be
$(libexecdir)/octave/$(version)/exec/$(canonical_host_type)
defining localarchlibdir to be
$(libexecdir)/octave/site/exec/$(canonical_host_type)
defining octfiledir to be
$(libexecdir)/octave/$(version)/oct/$(canonical_host_type)
defining localoctfiledir to be
$(libexecdir)/octave/site/oct/$(canonical_host_type)
defining localoctfilepath to be $(localoctfiledir)//
defining fcnfilepath to be
.:$(localoctfilepath):$(localfcnfilepath):$(octfiledir)//:$(fcnfiledir)//
defining imagedir to be $(datadir)/octave/$(version)/imagelib
defining imagepath to be .:$(imagedir)//
checking for c++... c++
checking whether the C++ compiler (c++  ) works... yes
checking whether the C++ compiler (c++  ) is a cross-compiler... no
checking whether we are using GNU C++... yes
checking whether c++ accepts -g... yes
checking how to run the C++ preprocessor... c++ -E
checking for C++ support for new friend template declaration... yes
checking for gcc... gcc
checking whether the C compiler (gcc  ) works... no
configure: error: installation or configuration problem: C compiler cannot
create executables.


Thanks for any advice!

Benjamin Martin Bly, Assistant Professor Department of
Psychology, Rutgers University Department of Radiology, University
Hospital, UMDNJ Office: (973) 353-1870 Fax: (973) 353-1171