The pattern.vector module comes bundled with precompiled binaries for libsvm. These should work on Windows and Mac OS X 32-bit and Mac OS X and Ubuntu 64-bit architectures. If not, you need to compile a binary from source.

To install from source, download the latest version of libsvm:
http://www.csie.ntu.edu.tw/~cjlin/libsvm/

- From the command line, do "make" in /libsvm. 
- Now do "make" in /libsvm/python. 
- You should see a file "libsvm.so.2", which is the binary you need.

Note: on Mac OS X, you may need to rename option "-soname" to "-install_name" in the Makefile.

Modify pattern/vector/libsvm/svm.py around line 15 to import the new binary. Please send us a copy too so we can include it in the next release.