Crazyflie PC client

The Crazyflie PC client enables flashing and controlling the Crazyflie. There's also a Python library that can be integrated into other applications where you would like to use the Crazyflie.

For more info see our wiki.

Installation

Linux

To install the Crazyflie PC client in Linux, you can run the setup script with:

sudo setup_linux.sh

This will install the Crazyflie PC client systemwide, create a udev entry for the Crazyradio and setup the permissions so that the current user can use the radio without root permissions after restarting the computer. For further instructions on how to run from source and install dependencies see bellow.

Windows

Follow these steps to install the binary distribution on Windows 7/8/10.

• Download the latest release here (named cfclient-win32-install-*.exe)
• Execute the installer. After the install the application will be added to the Start menu.
• Install the Crazyradio drivers by following these instructions

Running from source

Windows (7/8/10)

Install dependencies. With Windows installers (tested using only 32-bit installs on 64-bit OS):

• Python 3.4 (make sure the pip component is selected when installing)
• PyQT4 for Python 3.4
• NumPy for Python 3.4
• SDL2 (copy SDL2.dll into the client source folder)

Then install PyUSB, PyZMQ, PySDL2 and PyQtGraph using pip

C:\Users\bitcraze>\Python34\python.exe -m pip install pyusb==1.0.0b2 pyzmq pysdl2 pyqtgraph

Finally you run the client using the following command

\Python34\python bin\cfclient

NOTE: To use the Crazyradio you will have to install the drivers

Mac OSX

Using homebrew

IMPORTANT NOTE: The following will use Homebrew and its own Python distribution. If you have a lot of other 3rd party python stuff already running on your system they might or might not affected of this.

1. Install the Command Line Tools.

2. Install Homebrew.

3. Install Homebrew's Python3

   brew install python3
   

   This will also pull pip3, which we will use later to install some Python modules that are not distributed through Homebrew.

4. Install SDL for Python

   brew install sdl sdl2 sdl_image sdl_mixer sdl_ttf portmidi
   

5. Install PyQt

   If you already have pyqt installed for python2 you need to uninstall it first

   brew uninstall pyqt
   brew install pyqt --with-python3
   

6. Install remaining dependencies

   brew install libusb
   pip3 install pysdl2 pyusb pyqtgraph
   

7. You now have all the dependencies needed to run the client. From the source folder, run it with the following command:

   python bin/cfclient
   

Using MacPorts

1. Install MacPorts if needed. Otherwise update your installation with:

   sudo port selfupdate
   sudo port upgrade outdated
   

2. Install dependencies. Note that there are quite a few, so this could take a while:

   sudo port install libusb python34 py34-SDL2 py34-pyqt4 py34-pip
   

   To make the MacPorts python and pip the default commands:

   sudo port select --set python python34
   sudo port select --set python3 python34
   sudo port select --set pip pip34
   

   To install pyusb from pip, use:

   sudo pip install pyusb
   

   To enable the plotter tab install pyqtgraph, this takes a lot of time:

   sudo port install py34-pyqtgraph
   

   You can now run the client from the source folder with

   python bin/cfclient
   

   Or, if you did not run the port select command to set the MacPorts python as the default, use:

   /opt/local/bin/python3.4 bin/cfclient
   

3. To make it easier to run MacPorts, add /opt/local/bin to your PATH variable. The MacPorts installer should take care of that, but take a look at ~/.profile to make sure. If you have any issues it could be due to the libraries not getting picked up correctly. Fix that by setting DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH to /opt/local/lib in ~/.profile:

   export DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH=/opt/local/lib
   

Linux

Launching the GUI application

To launch the GUI application in the source folder type: python bin/cfclient

To launch the GUI after a systemwide installation, execute cfclient.

Dependencies

The Crazyflie PC client has the following dependencies:

• Python 3.4
• PyUSB
• libusb 1.X (works with 0.X as well)
• PyQtGraph
• ZMQ
• PyQt4

Example commands to install these dependencies:

• Fedora (tested for 16 to 18):

  sudo yum install pysdl2 pyusb PyQt4

• Ubuntu (15.04):

  sudo apt-get install python3 python3-pip python3-pyqt4 python3-zmq python3-pyqtgraph
  sudo pip3 install pyusb==1.0.0b2
  

• OpenSUSE (tested for 11.3):

  sudo zypper install python-pysdl2 libusb python-usb

Setting udev permissions

The following steps make it possible to use the USB Radio without being root.

Note: If using a fresh Debian install, you may need to install sudo first (executing exit command to exit from root shell first):

su -
apt-get install sudo

Now, with sudo installed, you should be able to do the following commands

sudo groupadd plugdev
sudo usermod -a -G plugdev <username>

Create a file named /etc/udev/rules.d/99-crazyradio.rules and add the following:

SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="1915", ATTRS{idProduct}=="7777", MODE="0664", GROUP="plugdev"

To connect Crazyflie 2.0 via usb, create a file name /etc/udev/rules.d/99-crazyflie.rules and add the following:

SUBSYSTEM=="usb", ATTRS{idVendor}=="0483", ATTRS{idProduct}=="5740", MODE="0664", GROUP="plugdev"

Restart the computer and you are now able to access the USB radio dongle without being root.