libfreenect

libfreenect is a userspace driver for the Microsoft Kinect. It runs on Linux, OSX, and Windows and supports

• RGB and Depth Images
• Motors
• Accelerometer
• LED
• Audio

Build Instructions

To build libfreenect, you’ll need

• libusb >= 1.0.18
• CMake >= 2.6
• python == 2.* (only if BUILD_PYTHON=ON or BUILD_REDIST_PACKAGE=OFF)

For the examples, you’ll need

• OpenGL (included with OSX)
• glut (included with OSX)
• pthreads-win32 (Windows)

For audio support, you must have firmware to upload to the Kinect. If you specify a non-redistributable package, firmware will be downloaded automatically:

cmake -L .. -DBUILD_REDIST_PACKAGE=OFF

Note that the downloaded firmware may not be legal to redistribute!

Fetch & Build

git clone https://github.com/OpenKinect/libfreenect
cd libfreenect
mkdir build
cd build
cmake -L ..
make

# if you don't have `make` or don't want color output
# cmake --build .

You can specify a build with debug symbols:

cmake -L .. -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=debug
# or with optimizations
# cmake -L .. -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RelWithDebInfo

You can build .deb, .rpm, and/or .tgz packages with cpack:

cmake .. -L -DBUILD_CPACK_DEB=ON -DBUILD_CPACK_RPM=ON -DBUILD_CPACK_TGZ=ON
cpack

OSX

If you don’t have a package manager, install Homebrew. For a manual build, see the wiki.

Homebrew

brew install libfreenect
# or get the very latest:
# brew install --HEAD libfreenect

MacPorts

sudo port install git-core cmake libusb libtool

Continue with Fetch & Build.

Linux

For a manual build, see the wiki.

Ubuntu/Debian/Mint

The version packaged in Ubuntu may be very old. To install newer packaged builds, see the wiki. Continue with this section for a manual build.

sudo apt-get install git-core cmake pkg-config build-essential libusb-1.0-0-dev
sudo adduser $USER video
sudo adduser $USER plugdev # necessary?

# only if you are building the examples:
sudo apt-get install libglut3-dev libxmu-dev libxi-dev

Continue with Fetch & Build.

There is also a debian branch for packaging purposes.

Gentoo Linux

There is a live ebuild for your convenience in platform/linux/portage/dev-libs/libfreenect/.

Arch Linux

There is a libfreenect PKGBUILD in the AUR. Alternately, the libfreenect-git PKGBUILD builds the very latest.

Windows

The inf files in platform/windows/ may be used for installing the device. Follow Fetch & Build or use Github and CMake GUI tools. You may need to supply paths to CMake so it can find dependencies. For example:

cmake .. -DLIBUSB_1_INCLUDE_DIR="C:\path\to\libusb\include" -DLIBUSB_1_LIBRARY="C:\path\to\libusb\libusb.lib"

Wrappers

Interfaces to various languages are provided in wrappers/. Wrappers are not guaranteed to be API stable or up to date.

• C (using a synchronous API)
• C++
• C#
• python
• ruby
• actionscript
• Java (JNA)

Python

cd wrappers/python
# if you have cython and want to rebuild the binding
# cython freenect.pyx
python2 setup.py build_ext --inplace

For example, start with demo_cv_async.py.

Code Contributions

In order of importance:

• Make sure to sign commits: git commit -s
• Use a feature branch in your own fork and target master with pull requests
• Tab indentation, no trailing whitespace

Maintainers

Ongoing Development and Maintenance by the OpenKinect Community

http://www.openkinect.org

• Original Code and Engineering: Hector Martin (marcan)
• Community Lead: Josh Blake (JoshB)
• Integration: Kyle Machulis (qDot)

License

The libfreenect project is covered under a dual Apache v2/GPL v2 license. The licensing criteria are listed below, as well as at the top of each source file in the repo.

This file is part of the OpenKinect Project. http://www.openkinect.org

Copyright (c) 2010 individual OpenKinect contributors. See the CONTRIB
file for details.

This code is licensed to you under the terms of the Apache License,
version 2.0, or, at your option, the terms of the GNU General Public
License, version 2.0. See the APACHE20 and GPL2 files for the text of
the licenses, or the following URLs:
http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt

If you redistribute this file in source form, modified or unmodified,
you may:

- Leave this header intact and distribute it under the same terms,
  accompanying it with the APACHE20 and GPL2 files, or
- Delete the Apache 2.0 clause and accompany it with the GPL2 file, or
- Delete the GPL v2 clause and accompany it with the APACHE20 file

In all cases you must keep the copyright notice intact and include a
copy of the CONTRIB file.

Binary distributions must follow the binary distribution requirements
of either License.

More Information

Information about the OpenKinect project can be found at http://www.openkinect.org

For questions, support, and discussion, check out the google groups mailing list at http://groups.google.com/group/openkinect

Or the IRC channel at #openkinect on Freenode

We are also on twitter at http://twitter.com/openkinect