Compiling PCL/KinFu

Here are the steps to compile the PCL (including KinFu and KinFu large scale) on Linux (Ubuntu 12.04).

KinFu is not available from the compiled binaries, it needs to be compiled from the sources (branch master).

Here are the steps to follow as of 12/10/2013:

Dependencies

The easiest is probably to install the latest PCL package (so the dependencies are installed automatically):
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:v-launchpad-jochen-sprickerhof-de/pcl 
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install libpcl-all

Tools

Install git, CMake using the package manager...

Clone the sources
git clone https://github.com/PointCloudLibrary/pcl

Build folder
Get in the source's main folder and create a build directory, get in it

CMake
Configure your CMake project using ccmake. ccmake is a tool which helps handling cmake files, it is installed with package cmake-curses-gui.
sudo apt-get install cmake-curses-gui

The configuration itself:

ccmake ..

Make sure you enable the following options (you need to have the CUDA toolkit installed and be in ccmake's advanced mode to have these show):

BUILD_GPU ON

CUDA_HOST_COMPILER /usr/bin/gcc-4.6 (or your CUDA-compatible gcc version)

cmake -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release ..

Also check you have these variables set (should already ben ON):

BUILD_gpu_kinfu ON

BUILD_gpu_kinfu_large_scale ON

CMake produces the makefile (and other files) in the build directory itself.

Make the binaries

make
(sudo) make install

All produced files (bin, lib, obj...) are stored in the build folder

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Installing the CUDA toolkit and SDK:

The CUDA toolkit package contains both the toolkit and the SDK (samples). It is a real pain to install:

• Do not install the graphics driver: nVidia's support for Linux seems to be rather loose and it is likely you update to a faulty driver version which prevents X to start. I had to reinstall Ubuntu because of this.
• nVidia advises to install the distribution-specific package (managed package .deb which loads in the Ubuntu Software Center) but it did not work for me, the Software Center said the package was faulty.
• Now when you install the distribution-agnostic package (.run file):


• Do not accept the graphics driver update (for the above mentioned reason)
• The installer tells you that CUDA is incompatible with gcc version 4.7.4. So it does not work either...


• The idea is thus to use Ammar Qammaz' script which uses a different version of gcc
• https://raw.github.com/AmmarkoV/MyScripts/master/Setup/install_cuda5
• This script does the following:
• Prevent the toolkit's gcc version checks at install using option override

<CUDA toolkit>.run -override compiler

• Install a compatible version of gcc (4.4) and sets nvcc to use it

Add option compiler-bindir in nvcc's profile

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Potentially useful links:

• http://www.pcl-users.org/Kinfu-problem-Don-t-get-a-build-Cuda-option-in-cmake-td4019977.html

• http://robotica.unileon.es/mediawiki/index.php/Kinect_tutorial_1:_First_steps

iisuOscBridge Sources

Good news!

The sources are now freely accessible to the world ;) I have put together a github project so this should make things easy for everyone to get access. Google code is actually much easier to use than I thought...

The chosen license is LGPL because I want this code to live as much as possible on its own. Hopefully this will allow to get more contributions from you guys ;)

Enjoy!

PS: I would really appreciate to get to know about you if you download the sources or executables. No worries, it's only because I am curious ;)

iisuOscBridge Download

Dear all,

here is a link to a windows installer for iisuOscBridge.

This link is using Dropbox. This is only a temporary way of sharing files with you, dear readers, until I put something better in place.

Initially the bridge is only going to be available under Windows and it is not clear yet whether there will be a linux port. It may be related to the number of people asking for it... So if you shout loud enough you may be heard ;)

Cheers,

Antoine.

Welcome!

Hiya all!

And welcome to the marvelous world of iisuOscBridge!

The SDK of iisu is a piece of middleware which provides motion capture data out of 3D cameras. It is able to provide you with the exact position and configuration of gamer or users. iisu is a bit like Kinect but in much cooler (hey, I am one of iisu’s designers after all ;)).

Now iisuOscBridge is a networking layer which works on top of iisu. That is iisuOscBridge streams data out of iisu and to the outside world using the OSC networking protocol.

The main goal of iisuOscbridge is to make the data provided by iisu easily available to the artists’ community. Using the oscBridge (I have been very intimate with this software, so oscBridge is the little short name I gave to iisuOscBridge - and… yes, you can build a strong growing relation with your code ;)) you can stream the iisu out to software such as Processing, Max, Processing, Pure data... anything that can receive OSC data.

I am actually employed by SoftKinetic, the company which produced iisu. And more than that, I am deeply involved in the R&D for the motion capture’s algorithms in iisu. Though it turns out iisuOscBridge is a side project I developed in my spare time. I have spent around four months on it, nights or week-ends…

This blog is aimed at providing you news and getting feedbacks on iisuOscBridge. So please, download it, use it, break it, get crazy about it… and let me know about it all! ;)

Thanks,

Antoine.