Installing¶
Install with apt¶
The advantage of using apt to install Flex GUI is when a new version of Flex GUI is released apt will know a new version is avaliable when you run sudo apt update. This will allow you to install the new version of Flex GUI along with other Debian software.
The first command will ask for your password. Neither command will print anything in the terminal.
For a PC to create an apt sources file for Flex GUI copy and paste this command in a terminal
echo 'deb [arch=amd64] https://gnipsel.com/flexgui/apt-repo stable main' | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/flexgui.list
For a Raspberry Pi create an apt sources file for Flex GUI copy and paste this command in a terminal
echo 'deb [arch=arm64] https://gnipsel.com/flexgui/apt-repo stable main' | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/flexgui.list
To check the above command worked you can list the file with this command
ls /etc/apt/sources.list.d
Next get the public key for Flex GUI and copy it to trusted.gpg.d
sudo curl --silent --show-error https://gnipsel.com/flexgui/apt-repo/pgp-key.public -o /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/flexgui.asc
If curl is not installed you can install it with the following command
sudo apt install curl
Next update apt
sudo apt update
If you have Flex GUI installed you can see what packages can be upgraded with the following command
apt list --upgradable
If Flex GUI is not installed you can install it with the following command
sudo apt install flexgui
Install the deb¶
You can still download the deb from github and install with gdebi if that works better for you. If you don’t have an internet connection this is the best way to install Flex GUI
Note
Between releases the deb will have the latest bug fixes
Download the latest deb file from >HERE<.
If the link is not clickable, copy and paste the following URL into your browser
https://github.com/jethornton/flexgui/releases
~amd64.deb is for PC’s and ~arm64.deb is for Raspberri Pi.
Select the latest release and click on the .deb to start a download.
Right click on the deb file and select Open with GDebi Package Installer. If that option is not there then GDebi is not installed, open a terminal and run this command to install it:
sudo apt install gdebi
An alternative is to install from the terminal outright using dpkg. Make sure the version number is correct for the deb you have the following command may be an older version.
sudo dpkg -i flexgui_1.1.0_amd64.deb
After installing Flex GUI, a menu item Copy Flex Examples is added to the CNC menu. This will copy the Flex GUI example files to ~/linuxcnc/configs/flex_examples.
Note
After updating the Flex GUI some examples may have changed. To get a fresh copy of the examples delete the linuxcnc/configs/flex_examples or rename it.