Linux Installation

Table of Contents

• Automated Install
• Manual Install
  • Build using SPIDEV

Generic Linux devices are supported via SPIDEV, MRAA, RPi native via BCM2835, or using LittleWire.

Note

The SPIDEV option should work with most Linux systems supporting spi userspace device.

Warning

These install instructions are beginning to age because they were designed with the assumption that the arm-linux-gnueabihf-g** compilers were available and default for the system. If you have problems using the manual install instructions (especially on a 64-bit OS), please try the instructions using CMake.

Note

Since wiringPi is no longer maintained or distributed (as of RPi OS 11 bullseye), pigpio is now required for using the radio's IRQ pin. This applies to RPi, SPIDEV, and pigpio drivers. The MRAA driver may provide its own IRQ implementation. Remember that the RPi OS lite variant does not ship with pigpio installed.

Automated Install

Designed & Tested on RPi - Defaults to SPIDEV on devices supporting it

1. Install prerequisites if there are any (pigpio, MRAA, LittleWire libraries, setup SPI device etc)
2. Download the install.sh file from http://tmrh20.github.io/RF24Installer/RPi/install.sh

   wget http://tmrh20.github.io/RF24Installer/RPi/install.sh

3. Make it executable

   chmod +x install.sh

4. Run it and choose your options

   ./install.sh

5. Run an example from one of the libraries

   cd rf24libs/RF24/examples_linux

   Edit the gettingstarted example, to set your pin configuration

   nano gettingstarted.cpp
   make
   sudo ./gettingstarted

Manual Install

1. Install prerequisites if there are any (pigpio, MRAA, LittleWire libraries, setup SPI device etc)

   Note

   See the MRAA documentation for more info on installing MRAA

2. Make a directory to contain the RF24 and possibly RF24Network lib and enter it

   mkdir ~/rf24libs
   cd ~/rf24libs

3. Clone the RF24 repo

   git clone https://github.com/tmrh20/RF24.git RF24

4. Change to the new RF24 directory

   cd RF24

5. Configure build environment using

   ./configure

   script. It auto detectes device and build environment.

   For overriding autodetections, use command-line switches, see

   ./configure --help

   for description.

6. Build the library, and run an example file

   make
   sudo make install

   cd examples_linux

   Edit the gettingstarted example, to set your pin configuration

   ano gettingstarted.cpp
   make
   sudo ./gettingstarted

Build using SPIDEV

1. Make sure that spi device support is enabled and /dev/spidev<a>.<b> is present
2. Manual Install using SPIDEV:

   ./configure --driver=SPIDEV
   make
   sudo make install

3. See the gettingstarted example for an example of pin configuration