How to install glibc-2.4 correctly

Hello,

I installed glibc-2.4 last week.  I have gone through the install document and looked at the FAQ online and in both documents there is quite a lot of information to absorb.  I would like to know if someone could just trim it down and just tell what I need to know to install it correctly?  In particular,

where should it be installed
will tar -xvf glibc-2.4.tar properly open the tar file
and do I need to do anything more before compiling my C++ programs using make and cc in the console

Thanks.

Urmila