sudo aptitude install checkinstall

Now as an example I will compile and install aterm which is a terminal emulator, I will write about it later.

Ok, get the code

wget ftp://ftp.afterstep.org/apps/aterm/aterm-1.0.1.tar.gz

Untar it

tar xvzf aterm-1.0.1.tar.gz

Change to its directory:

cd aterm-1.0.1

Now, usually at this point you have to enter three commands

./configure
make
make install

This time we will enter only the first two:

./configure

make

Now, here comes the magic, staying at the same directory change to root or use sudo

sudo checkinstall

You will see something like this, the first time:

checkinstall 1.6.1, Copyright 2002 Felipe Eduardo Sanchez Diaz Duran
           This software is released under the GNU GPL.

           The package documentation directory ./doc-pak does not exist.
           Should I create a default set of package docs?  [y]:
Preparing package documentation...OK
Please write a description for the package.
End your description with an empty line or EOF.
>> aterm 1.0.1
*****************************************
**** Debian package creation selected ***
*****************************************
This package will be built according to these values:

0 -  Maintainer: [ root@ggarron ]
1 -  Summary: [ aterm 1.0.1 ]
2 -  Name:    [ aterm ]
3 -  Version: [ 1.0.1 ]
4 -  Release: [ 1 ]
5 -  License: [ GPL ]
6 -  Group:   [ checkinstall ]
7 -  Architecture: [ i386 ]
8 -  Source location: [ aterm-1.0.1 ]
9 -  Alternate source location: [  ]
10 - Requires: [  ]
Enter a number to change any of them or press ENTER to continue:
Copying files to the temporary directory...OK
Stripping ELF binaries and libraries...OK
Compressing man pages...OK
Building file list...OK
Building Debian package...OK
Installing Debian package...OK
Erasing temporary files...OK
Writing backup package...OK
Deleting temp dir...OK
**********************************************************************
 Done. The new package has been installed and saved to
 /home/ggarron/Desktop/borrar/aterm-1.0.1/aterm_1.0.1-1_i386.deb
 You can remove it from your system anytime using:
 dpkg -r aterm