1 I. GENERAL LINUX INSTRUCTIONS
2 ==============================
4 This is a short description of the things that need to be done to get
5 FlightGear up and running under Linux.
9 You need to understand the concepts of 3D acceleration under Linux and
10 the needed libraries. An excellent source of information is the "Linux
11 3Dfx HOWTO" which can be found at
13 http://www.gamers.org/dEngine/xf3D/howto/3Dfx-HOWTO.html
15 If anything seem to be wrong with your 3D setup, check there first!
17 You need Linux of course (any flavour) and a 3DFX-card (Voodoo1 in my
18 case). 3D rendering without hardware support can force even the
19 fastest PII to its knees. To make use of the accelerator board you
22 - the GLIDE library installed. Grab it at:
24 http://www.3dfx.com/software/download_glidel.html
26 and install. There is even an install script contained that will do
27 things for you. The canonical place for GLIDE is /usr/local/glide,
28 if you prefer another location, you'll have to edit the Makefile for
29 FlightGear by hand. Be sure to read and understand the file
30 /usr/local/glide/README.
32 - the MESA library version 3.0 (or greater) installed.
36 http://www.mesa3d.org/
38 unpack it and run "make linux-glide" in the Mesa directory. Follow
39 the instructions in the README file, take a close look at
40 README.3DFX and play with the demo programs. Relax, rejoice :-)
42 - the GLUT library version 3.7 (or greater, aka GameGLUT) installed.
46 http://reality.sgi.com/opengl/glut3/glut3.html
48 Note: glut-3.7 is included with Mesa 3.0 so if you've already
49 grabbed the latest version of mesa, you should have everything you
54 You will need the following files:
56 FlightGear-x.xx.tar.gz (source code)
58 which can be found under
60 ftp://ftp.flightgear.org/pub/fgfs/Source/
62 and the support files located at
64 ftp://ftp.flightgear.org/pub/fgfs/Binaries/
68 fgfs-base-x.xx.tar.gz (data files)
70 Ok, now that you got all the stuff, let's proceed towards installation.
72 Unpack FlightGear-x.xx.tar.gz using :
74 tar xvfz FlightGear-x.xx.tar.gz
76 and cd info FlightGear-x.xx. Run:
80 and wait a few minutes. configure knows about a lot of options. Have a
81 look at the file INSTALL in the FlightGear source directory to learn
82 about them. If run without options, configure assumes that you will
83 install the data files under /usr/local/lib/FlightGear. Assuming
84 configure finished successfully, simply run
88 and wait for the make process to finish. Now become root (for example
89 by using the su command) and type
93 This will install the binaries in /usr/local/bin. Notice that the name
94 of the FlightGear binary is "fgfs".
96 Another problem with Linux/Glide is permission-related. All programs
97 accessing the Accelerator board need root permissions. The solution is
98 either to play as root or make the /usr/local/bin/fgfs binary "setuid
99 root", i.e. when this binary is run root priviledges are given. Do
100 this by issuing (as root)
102 chmod +s /usr/local/bin/fgfs
104 A solution for this problem is upcoming, keep an eye on the 3Dfx
107 3. Install the data files
109 Change to /usr/local/lib/FlightGear and unpack the data files:
111 tar xvfz WHERE_YOU DOWNLOADED_THE_FILES/fgfs-base-x.xx.tar.gz
117 If everything went ok, simply type
121 at the prompt. You should see the FlightGear splash-screen and a few
122 seconds later you'll find youself somewhere in the desert, ready for
125 5. Strange things happen...
127 A note on the behaviour of Voodoo boards:
129 Your card comes packaged with a loop-through-cable. If you have only
130 one monitor, then the Voodoo will take it over when used. This means
131 that all the applications on your desktop will continue running but
132 you'll only see the FlightGear screen. If your window manager uses a
133 focus-follows-mouse policy, don't move the mouse. If you lose the
134 focus, there's no way to shut down FlightGear graciously! Better
135 solution: Use two monitors, one for your desktop, connect the other
136 one to your accelerator. You'll then get a window on your desktop
137 which manages all keyboard events and you're still able to see your
140 A final note: There are several types of VooDoo cards out there, so be
141 sure to get the correct version of Glide!
147 I hope this document provides some help. If it does, send virtual/real
148 beer to me, if not flame me!
151 <buckel@wmad95.mathematik.uni-wuerzburg.de>
157 As of 2/19/99 I'm not aware of any glide port to Linux/AXP so it's
158 software rendering only for now. :-(
160 This following information is contributed by "Daniel J. Frasnelli"
161 <dfrasnel@csee.wvu.edu>
163 1) Mesa was not built correctly by default. I had to add the "-mieee"
164 flag to the Make-config for Mesa-3.1beta1 to fix the problem. After
165 building and installation, all of the problems I had previously with
166 GL programs under AlphaLinux disappeared.
168 2) I also had to set the '-mieee' flag in $CFLAGS before configuring
169 and building FGFS. The -mieee switch fixes floating point exception
172 I heavily optimized both Mesa and FGFS, using the libffm "fast math
173 library for Alpha" in preference over the default libm, sticking all
174 sorts of strange flags in $CFLAGS, etc. These flags should be
175 adjusted for your specific architecture:
177 export CFLAGS="-mieee -mcpu=ev56 -Wa,-m21164a -pipe -g"
178 export CXXFLAGS="-mieee -mcpu=ev56 -Wa,-m21164a -pipe -g"