diff --git a/checklibs.sh b/checklibs.sh
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..b1483de68
--- /dev/null
+++ b/checklibs.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,74 @@
+#!/bin/sh
+
+NDIR=${NDIR:-$PWD}
+
+newest() {
+    perl -ne'$n=pack"C*",split/\./;$m=($m,$n)[$n gt$m];END{print join".",unpack("C*",$m)}'
+}
+
+trim_version() {
+    echo $1 | sed 's/\(^\|\.\)0*/\1/g'
+}
+
+check_libpcre() {
+    PCRE_SOURCE="ftp://ftp.csx.cam.ac.uk/pub/software/programming/pcre/"
+    PCRE_MAJOR=""
+    PCRE_MINOR=""
+    eval $(grep '^PCRE_MAJOR=' $NDIR/libpcre/configure)
+    eval $(grep '^PCRE_MINOR=' $NDIR/libpcre/configure)
+    PCRE_VERSION="$PCRE_MAJOR.$PCRE_MINOR"
+    PCRE_LATEST=$(curl -ls $PCRE_SOURCE | perl -lne 'if(/pcre-(\d+.\d+).tar.gz$/){print $1}' | newest)
+    if [ "$PCRE_VERSION" != "$PCRE_LATEST" ]; then
+        echo "Newer version of libpcre available"
+        echo "  Current:" $PCRE_VERSION
+        echo "  Latest: " $PCRE_LATEST
+        echo "  Source: $PCRE_SOURCE"
+    fi
+}
+
+check_libpcap() {
+    PCAP_SOURCE="http://www.tcpdump.org/release/"
+    PCAP_VERSION=$(cat $NDIR/libpcap/VERSION)
+    PCAP_LATEST=$(curl -s $PCAP_SOURCE | perl -lne 'if(/libpcap-([\d.]+).tar.gz/){print $1}' | newest)
+    if [ "$PCAP_VERSION" != "$PCAP_LATEST" ]; then
+        echo "Newer version of libpcap available"
+        echo "  Current:" $PCAP_VERSION
+        echo "  Latest: " $PCAP_LATEST
+        echo "  Source: $PCAP_SOURCE"
+    fi
+}
+
+check_liblua() {
+    LUA_SOURCE="http://www.lua.org/ftp/"
+    cat >check_liblua.c <<EOC
+#include "lua.h"
+#include<stdio.h>
+int main(int argc,char *argv[]){
+printf("%s\\n", LUA_RELEASE);
+return 0;
+}
+EOC
+    cc -I"$NDIR/liblua" -o check_liblua check_liblua.c
+    LUA_VERSION=$(./check_liblua)
+    LUA_VERSION=${LUA_VERSION#Lua }
+    rm check_liblua check_liblua.c
+    LUA_LATEST=$(curl -s $LUA_SOURCE | perl -lne 'if(/lua-([\d.]+).tar.gz/){print $1}' | newest)
+    if [ "$LUA_VERSION" != "$LUA_LATEST" ]; then
+        echo "Newer version of liblua available"
+        echo "  Current:" $LUA_VERSION
+        echo "  Latest: " $LUA_LATEST
+        echo "  Source: $LUA_SOURCE"
+    fi
+}
+
+check_liblinear() {
+    LINEAR_SOURCE="http://www.csie.ntu.edu.tw/~cjlin/liblinear/"
+    echo "Can't check liblinear, no version information is available"
+    LINEAR_LATEST=$(curl -s $LINEAR_SOURCE | perl -lne 'if(/The current release \(([^)]+)\) of <b>LIBLINEAR/){print $1;exit 0}')
+    echo "  Latest:" $LINEAR_LATEST
+}
+
+check_libpcre
+check_libpcap
+check_liblua
+check_liblinear