Intel® RealSense™ Cross Platform API
Intel Realsense Cross-platform API
Linux Ubuntu Installation

Note: Due to the USB 3.0 translation layer between native hardware and virtual machine, the librealsense team does not support installation in a VM. If you do choose to try it, we recommend using VMware Workstation Player, and not Oracle VirtualBox for proper emulation of the USB3 controller.

Please ensure to work with the supported Kernel versions listed here and verify that the kernel is updated properly according to the instructions.

Ubuntu Build Dependencies

The scripts and commands below invoke wget, git, add-apt-repository which may be blocked by router settings or a firewall. Infrequently, apt-get mirrors or repositories may also timeout. For librealsense users behind an enterprise firewall, configuring the system-wide Ubuntu proxy generally resolves most timeout issues.

Prerequisites

Important: Running RealSense Depth Cameras on Linux requires patching and inserting modified kernel drivers. Some OEM/Vendors choose to lock the kernel for modifications. Unlocking this capability may requires to modify BIOS settings

Make Ubuntu Up-to-date:

  1. Update Ubuntu distribution, including getting the latest stable kernel
    • sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
      Note: On stock Ubuntu 14 LTS systems and Kernel prior to 4.4.0-04 the standard apt-get upgrade command is not sufficient to bring the distribution to the latest recommended baseline. On those systems the following should be used: sudo apt-get install --install-recommends linux-generic-lts-xenial xserver-xorg-core-lts-xenial xserver-xorg-lts-xenial xserver-xorg-video-all-lts-xenial xserver-xorg-input-all-lts-xenial libwayland-egl1-mesa-lts-xenial

Prepare Linux Backend and the Dev. Environment:

  1. Navigate to librealsense root directory to run the following scripts.
    Unplug any connected Intel RealSense camera.
  2. Install the core packages required to build librealsense binaries and the affected kernel modules: sudo apt-get install git libssl-dev libusb-1.0-0-dev pkg-config libgtk-3-dev

    Distribution-specific packages:

    • Ubuntu 14 or when running of Ubuntu 16.04 live-disk:
      sudo apt-get install cmake3
      ./scripts/install_glfw3.sh
    • Ubuntu 16:
      sudo apt-get install cmake3 libglfw3-dev
    • Ubuntu 18:
      sudo apt-get install cmake libglfw3-dev libgl1-mesa-dev libglu1-mesa-dev

    Note on graphic sub-system utilization:
    glfw3, mesa and gtk packages are required if you plan to build the SDK's OpenGl-enabled examples. The librealsense core library and a range of demos/tools are designed for headless environment deployment.

  3. Install Intel Realsense permission scripts located in librealsense source directory:
    sudo cp config/99-realsense-libusb.rules /etc/udev/rules.d/
    sudo udevadm control --reload-rules && udevadm trigger
  4. Build and apply patched kernel modules for:
    • Ubuntu 14/16/18 LTS script will download, patch and build realsense-affected kernel modules (drivers).
      Then it will attempt to insert the patched module instead of the active one. If failed the original uvc modules will be restored.

      ./scripts/patch-realsense-ubuntu-lts.sh

    • Intel® Joule™ with Ubuntu Based on the custom kernel provided by Canonical Ltd.

      ./scripts/patch-realsense-ubuntu-xenial-joule.sh

    • Arch-based distributions
      • You need to install the base-devel package group.
      • You also need to install the matching linux-headers as well (i.e.: linux-lts-headers for the linux-lts kernel).
        • Navigate to the scripts folder cd ./scripts/
        • Then run the following script to patch the uvc module: ./patch-arch.sh

    • Check the patched modules installation by examining the generated log as well as inspecting the latest entries in kernel log:
      sudo dmesg | tail -n 50
      The log should indicate that a new uvcvideo driver has been registered. Refer to Troubleshooting in case of errors/warning reports.
  5. TM1-specific:
    • Tracking Module requires hid_sensor_custom kernel module to operate properly. Due to TM1's power-up sequence constrains, this driver is required to be loaded during boot for the HW to be properly initialized.

      In order to accomplish this add the driver's name hid_sensor_custom to /etc/modules file, eg: ```sh echo 'hid_sensor_custom' | sudo tee -a /etc/modules ``

Building librealsense2 SDK

  1. Install IDE (Optional): We use QtCreator as an IDE for Linux development on Ubuntu
    • Follow the link for QtCreator5 installation

Troubleshooting Installation and Patch-related Issues

Error Cause Correction Steps
git.launchpad... access timeout Behind Firewall Configure Proxy Server
dmesg:... uvcvideo: module verification failed: signature and/or required key missing - tainting kernel A standard warning issued since Kernel 4.4-30+ Notification only - does not affect module's functionality
sudo modprobe uvcvideo produces dmesg: uvc kernel module is not loaded The patched module kernel version is incompatible with the resident kernel Verify the actual kernel version with uname -r.
Revert and proceed from Make Ubuntu Up-to-date step
Execution of ./scripts/patch-video-formats-ubuntu-xenial.sh fails with fatal error: openssl/opensslv.h Missing Dependency Install openssl package from Video4Linux backend preparation step