This project details the installation and the programming of the Microsoft Kinect using Libfreenect, OpenNI, NITE as well as PyOpenNI on an ubuntu-15.10 system.
The installation of all the files was done on a clean install of ubuntu-15.10. There is no guarantee that this would work on other distributions especially versions of Ubuntu earlier than Ubuntu 10.x. It also seems that installation instructions have a lifespan, so these instructions may no longer be valid in the future. They do work as of 28 March 2017.
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install git-core cmake python-dev python-numpy freeglut3-dev pkg-config build-essential libxmu-dev libxi-dev libusb-1.0-0-dev libgtk2.0-dev doxygen graphviz
mkdir ~/kinect
cd ~/kinect
git clone https://github.com/OpenKinect/libfreenect
git clone https://github.com/OpenNI/OpenNI
git clone https://github.com/avin2/SensorKinect
cd ~/kinect/libfreenect
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..
make
sudo make install*
sudo ldconfig /usr/local/lib64/*
To ensure that Libfreenect has been installed correctly, connect your kinect and run:
sudo freenect-glview
and you should see the infrared and camera view from the kinect.
Now install java:
sudo apt-get install default-jdk
cd ~/kinect/OpenNI
git checkout Unstable-1.5.4.0
cd Platform/Linux/CreateRedist
chmod +x RedistMaker
./RedistMaker
cd ../Redist/Sensor-Bin-Linux-x64-v5.1.2.1/
sudo ./install.sh
If you do not run the checkout command the next set of instructions will not work.
cd ~/kinect/SensorKinect/Platform/Linux/CreateRedist
chmod +x RedistMaker
./RedistMaker
cd ../Redist/Sensor-Bin-Linux-x64-v5.1.2.1
chmod +x install.sh
sudo ./install.sh
At this point some of the OpenNI examples will work. If you look in the ~/kinect/OpenNI/Platform/Linux/Bin/x64-Release folder you will see some examples that can be executed. Running ./Sample-NiSimpleViewer should run the one example. The other examples won’t work until we install NITE.
download Nite from https://code.google.com/archive/p/simple-openni/downloads and unzip the package and put it in ~/kinect
go to the folder ~/kinect/OpenNI_NITE_Installer-Linux64-0.27/NITE-Bin-Dev-Linux-x64-v1.5.2.21/Data/ and edit the 3 XML files.
In each replace the appropriate line to <vendor="PrimeSense" key="0KOIk2JeIBYClPWVnMoRKn5cdY4=“>.
./install.sh
niLicense PrimeSense 0KOIk2JeIBYClPWVnMoRKn5cdY4=
niLicense -l
can try to interchange those instructions…
Now check that the rest of the examples from OpenNI work (~/kinect/OpenNI/Platform/Linux/Bin/x64-Release). These are binary files (or whatever) and cannot be edited. The files that can be edited are in ~/kinect/OpenNI/Samples
It is possible to edit these files and the compile them by going to ~/kinect/OpenNI/Platform/Linux/Build and running make which compiles the files to the ~/kinect/OpenNI/Platform/Linux/Bin/x64-Release folder. But who wants to do that when you can code in Python?
sudo apt-get install cmake build-essential git-core
python-dev libboost-python-dev
git clone https://github.com/jmendeth/PyOpenNI.git
cd PyOpenNI
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..
make
sudo cp ./lib/openni.so /usr/lib/python2.7/
Now the examples in PyOpenNi and you can program in glorious python good luck!
The websites I gathered the instructions from:
https://sigmaoctantis.wordpress.com/2015/07/07/kinect-installation-in-ubuntu-14-10/
http://www.etti.tuiasi.ro/cin/Courses/SistEmbedded/Projects/Linux/BeagleBoard/Kinect_on_Ubuntu/Kinect_on_Ubuntu.html