More complete build documentation is available on the libarchive
Wiki:  http://libarchive.googlecode.com/

On most Unix-like systems, you should be able to install libarchive,
bsdtar, and bsdcpio using the following common steps:
    ./configure
    make
    make install

If you need to customize the target directories or otherwise adjust
the build setting, use
    ./configure --help
to list the configure options.

If you are developing libarchive and need to update the
configure script and other build files:
    /bin/sh build/autogen.sh

To create a distribution, please use the 'distcheck' target:
    /bin/sh build/autogen.sh && ./configure && make distcheck

On non-Unix-like systems, use the "cmake" utility (available from
http://cmake.org/) to generate suitable build files for your platform.
Cmake requires the name of the directory containing CmakeLists.txt and
the "generator" to use for your build environment.  For example, to
build with Xcode on Mac OS, you can use the following command:
    cmake -G "Xcode" ~/libarchive-download-dir/
The result will be appropriate makefiles, solution files, or project
files that can be used with the corresponding development tool.
See the libarchive Wiki or the cmake site for further documentation.