Linux executables

I am gonna attempt to explain how to use (some of) my software on linux. First, you need to locate the downloadable archives that are available for linux on the 3d software page. If the particular piece of software you are interested in exists for linux, then you are in luck. If it does not exist, then let me know and I will try to make it available on linux for you.

Now, I am assuming you have installed a fairly recent 64-bit distribution of linux on your computer and that you have installed gcc using your favorite package manager. You will need to have gcc version 5.4.0 or newer installed. If you have no idea how to do that, open you favorite packager like the Synaptic package manager, click on "Development", search for "g++" and click on the "g++" package (should be at the top of the list). Click "Apply" and Bob's your uncle. Since gcc 5.4.0 is pretty old (2016), you should have no problem running my software with a recent ubuntu linux install.

Let's say you want to run Depth Map Automatic Generator 5 (DMAG5) on linux. You are in luck as it is part of ugosoft3d-5-nogui-x86_64-linux.tar.gz.

After you have extracted the ugosoft3d-5-x86_64-linux.tar.gz archive (using gunzip and tar), you should have something like:
- dmag5 (that's the dmag5 executable)
- dmag5_test (that's a convenient directory to test dmag5)
- dmag5b (that's the dmag5b executable)
- dmag5b_test (that's a convenient directory to test dmag5b)
- a bunch of shared libraries that you may or may not need depending on your linux install

The way to run dmag5 is to go into the dmag5_test directory, type "./../dmag5" and press return in the terminal (assumed to be a bash shell). If you get an error about some shared library, type "LD_LIBRARY_PATH=./.." and press return. Here, I am simply indicating that the shared libs are located one directory above. If you have put the shared libraries somewhere else, just put the proper directory. Then, type "export LD_LIBRARY_PATH" and press return. The executable should run without problems now. It is very likely you will get an error about the libpng12.so.0 shared library that was used to link the exec as it's quite old. Of course, you can put all those linux commands into a bash shell script, for convenience.

Same idea for dmag5b.

To get some explanation about what the parameters in the "*_input.txt" (where * is executable name) mean, you can either download the 64-bit version of the executable via the 3d software page and look at "*_manual.pdf" (it usually exists and is up to date) or go to the web page that describes the executable again via the 3d software page.