1 Introduction

This page is dedicated to explaining how to install OpenFOAM in Ubuntu.

If you do not yet feel comfortable using Linux, then perhaps you better first read the page Working with the Shell and train a bit with the shell/terminal environments, so you can have a better perception of the steps shown below.

2 Copy-Paste steps

A few notes before you start copy-pasting:

Lines that start with # don't have to be copy-pasted. They are just comments to let you know what's going on.
One wrong character is enough for breaking this guide, so make sure you can read the characters properly or that the installed language system does not break the copied characters!

2.1 Ubuntu 12.04

Here you have the following choices:

Following the official instructions from here: Repository Release - version 2.4.x
Or by following the detailed step-by-step instructions below...

Discussion thread where you can ask questions about these steps: No thread available. Please a create a new thread in the forum.

Steps:

Switch to root mode (administrator), to install the necessary packages:
```
sudo -s
```
- If the 'sudo' command tells you're not in the sudoers list, then run:
```
su -
```
Update the apt-get cache by running:
```
apt-get update
```

Install the necessary packages:

apt-get install git-core build-essential flex bison zlib1g-dev qt4-dev-tools libqt4-dev gnuplot libreadline-dev \
libncurses-dev libxt-dev libopenmpi-dev openmpi-bin libboost-system-dev libboost-thread-dev libgmp-dev libmpfr-dev \
python python-dev

Note: It has been reported that the following should also be executed in some cases, so that ParaView and CGAL will build properly:

apt-get install libglu1-mesa-dev libqt4-opengl-dev

Now exit from the root mode:
```
exit
```

Download and unpack (here you can copy-paste all in single go):

#OpenFOAM downloading and installation
cd ~
mkdir OpenFOAM
cd OpenFOAM
git clone https://github.com/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x.git
git clone https://github.com/OpenFOAM/ThirdParty-2.4.x.git

But we will now have to download a few more of the necessary packages for the ThirdParty-2.4.x folder:

First, we need to prepare for the downloads:
```
cd ThirdParty-2.4.x
mkdir download
```

Now, we need to download the essential source code packages for these instructions you are following (the links are from the file README.org):

wget -P download http://www.paraview.org/files/v4.1/ParaView-v4.1.0-source.tar.gz
wget -P download http://www.cmake.org/files/v2.8/cmake-2.8.12.1.tar.gz
wget -P download https://gforge.inria.fr/frs/download.php/file/34099/scotch_6.0.3.tar.gz
wget -P download https://gforge.inria.fr/frs/download.php/file/34703/CGAL-4.6.tar.bz2

Next, we need to unpack the packages we've downloaded:

tar -xzf download/ParaView-v4.1.0-source.tar.gz
tar -xzf download/cmake-2.8.12.1.tar.gz
tar -xzf download/scotch_6.0.3.tar.gz
tar -xjf download/CGAL-4.6.tar.bz2

And we need to correct some folder names... in this case, it's just ParaView:
```
mv ParaView-v4.1.0 ParaView-4.1.0
```
Last but not least, the final command on this sub-list is to go back to the main OpenFOAM folder:
```
cd ..
```

Optional: Let's make a few symbolic links that should ensure that the correct global MPI installation is used by this OpenFOAM installation:
```
ln -s /usr/bin/mpicc.openmpi OpenFOAM-2.4.x/bin/mpicc
ln -s /usr/bin/mpirun.openmpi OpenFOAM-2.4.x/bin/mpirun
```
This way we avoid having problems in case there is more than one MPI toolbox installed in your Ubuntu system, for example if MPICH2 is installed and is the default MPI toolbox.

For building OpenFOAM itself, it depends on whether you have installed the i686 or x86_64 architecture of Ubuntu. To check this, run:

uname -m

Now, accordingly:

For i686:

#here you can change 4 to the number of cores you've got
source $HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc WM_NCOMPPROCS=4 WM_ARCH_OPTION=32

For x86_64:

#here you can change 4 to the number of cores you've got
source $HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc WM_NCOMPPROCS=4

Save an alias in the personal .bashrc file, simply by running the following command:
```
echo "alias of24x='source \$HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc $FOAM_SETTINGS'" >> $HOME/.bashrc
```
Note: This last line means that whenever you start a new terminal window or tab, you should run the alias command associated to the OpenFOAM 2.4.x shell environment. In other words, whenever you start a new terminal, you should run:
```
of24x
```
For more information on this topic, read section Using aliases to help manage multiple OpenFOAM versions in the page Installation/Working with the Shell.
Ubuntu 12.04 comes with CMake 2.8.7, but ParaView 4.1.0 needs CMake 2.8.8 or newer series; CGAL also needs CMake. Therefore, we'll need to do a custom build:
```
cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR
./makeCmake > log.makeCM 2>&1
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS
```

Now let's build the ThirdParty folder, because we need the shell environment to be updated afterwards, for CGAL to be properly picked up for building OpenFOAM:

cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR
 
# This next command will take a while... somewhere between 5 minutes to 30 minutes.
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1
 
#update the shell environment
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS

Now, in order to build ParaView 4.1.0, including with the ability to use Python and MPI, several steps are needed:

Need to do several fixes:

sed -i -e 's=//#define GLX_GLXEXT_LEGACY=#define GLX_GLXEXT_LEGACY=' \
  ParaView-4.1.0/VTK/Rendering/OpenGL/vtkXOpenGLRenderWindow.cxx
 
cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR/ParaView-4.1.0
 
wget http://www.paraview.org/pipermail/paraview/attachments/20140210/464496cc/attachment.bin -O Fix.patch
patch -p1 < Fix.patch
 
cd VTK
wget https://github.com/gladk/VTK/commit/ef22d3d69421581b33bc0cd94b647da73b61ba96.patch -O Fix2.patch
patch -p1 < Fix2.patch
 
cd ../..

For building ParaView with Python and MPI, run:

#this will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 2 hours or more
./makeParaView4 -python -mpi -python-lib /usr/lib/libpython2.7.so.1.0 > log.makePV 2>&1

Once the makeParaView4 script is finished running, make sure to check the contents of the file log.makePV and check if there are any errors.
Finally, update the shell environment:
```
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS
```

Now let's build OpenFOAM:
(Warning: this may take somewhere from 30 minutes to 6 hours, depending on your machine.)

#Go into OpenFOAM's main source folder
cd $WM_PROJECT_DIR
 
# This next command will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 3-6 hours.
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1
 
#Run it a second time for getting a summary of the installation
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1

To check if everything went well:
1. Check if icoFoam is working, by running this command:
```
icoFoam -help
```
  which should tell you something like this:
```
Usage: icoFoam [OPTIONS]
options:
  -case <dir>       specify alternate case directory, default is the cwd
  -noFunctionObjects
                    do not execute functionObjects
  -parallel         run in parallel
  -roots <(dir1 .. dirN)>
                    slave root directories for distributed running
  -srcDoc           display source code in browser
  -doc              display application documentation in browser
  -help             print the usage
```
  Note: And keep in mind that you need to be careful with the letter case of the command. It's icoFoam, not icoFOAM.
2. If the previous command failed to work properly, then edit the file log.make and check if there are any error messages. A few examples on how you can edit this file:
  - By using kwrite:
```
kwrite log.make
```
  - By using gedit:
```
gedit log.make
```
  - By using nano:
```
nano log.make
```
    You can then exit by using the key combination Ctrl+X and following any instructions it gives you.
  Note: It's the first error message that matters.
3. If you don't understand the output, then please compress the log-file log.make and attach the compressed file to a post in the designated thread.
  If you do not know how to create a compressed file, then try one of the following examples:
  - You can compress the file with gzip by running this command:
```
gzip < log.make > log.make.gz
```
    Then attach the resulting package file named log.make.gz to a post in the designated thread.
  - Or you can compress one or more log-files into a tarball package file, by running this command:
```
tar -czf logs.tar.gz log.*
```
    Then attach the resulting package file named logs.tar.gz to a post in the designated thread.
4. Instructions on how to further diagnose the issue yourself, have a look at the section Common errors when building OpenFOAM from source code in the page FAQ/Installation and Running.
Now you can go read the User Guide, where you may have more than one choice:
1. Which you can find a local copy of the User Guide by running the following command:
```
ls -A1 $WM_PROJECT_DIR/doc/Guides*/*UserGuide*.pdf
```
  - You should see two available formats: A4 and US-Letter.
  - But if it instead tells you that there is No such file or directory, then the OpenFOAM environment is possibly not properly activated.
2. You can also find the more recent OpenFOAM Foundation User Guides online at the following page: official OpenFOAM User Guide - but be careful if you use the version that is too much ahead of the version you are currently using, given that some features have changed overtime.
When you need to update your local clone, for getting the latest source code updates, you can follow the instructions provided in the page Installation/Working with git repositories.

Reminder: Whenever you start a new terminal window or tab, you should run the alias command associated to the OpenFOAM 2.4.x shell environment. In other words, run the following command whenever you start a new terminal:

of24x

For more information on this topic, read section Using aliases to help manage multiple OpenFOAM versions in the page Installation/Working with the Shell.

Discussion thread where you can ask questions about these steps: No thread available. Please a create a new thread in the forum.

2.2 Ubuntu 14.04

Here you have the following choices:

Following the official instructions from here: Repository Release - version 2.4.x
Or by following the detailed step-by-step instructions below...

Discussion thread where you can ask questions about these steps: OpenFOAM 2.4.x installation on Ubuntu 14.04: cmake unmet dependency error

Steps:

Switch to root mode (administrator), to install the necessary packages:
```
sudo -s
```
- If the 'sudo' command tells you're not in the sudoers list, then run:
```
su -
```
Update the apt-get cache by running:
```
apt-get update
```

Install the necessary packages:

apt-get install git-core build-essential cmake-data cmake flex bison zlib1g-dev qt4-dev-tools libqt4-dev libqtwebkit-dev gnuplot \
libreadline-dev libncurses-dev libxt-dev libopenmpi-dev openmpi-bin libboost-system-dev libboost-thread-dev libgmp-dev \
libmpfr-dev  python python-dev

Note: It has been reported that the following should also be executed in some cases, so that ParaView and CGAL will build properly:

apt-get install libglu1-mesa-dev libqt4-opengl-dev

Now exit from the root mode:
```
exit
```

Download and unpack (here you can copy-paste all in single go):

#OpenFOAM downloading and installation
cd ~
mkdir OpenFOAM
cd OpenFOAM
git clone https://github.com/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x.git
git clone https://github.com/OpenFOAM/ThirdParty-2.4.x.git

But we will now have to download a few more of the necessary packages for the ThirdParty-2.4.x folder:

First, we need to prepare for the downloads:
```
cd ThirdParty-2.4.x
mkdir download
```

Now, we need to download the essential source code packages for these instructions you are following (the links are from the file README.org):

wget -P download http://www.paraview.org/files/v4.1/ParaView-v4.1.0-source.tar.gz
wget -P download https://gforge.inria.fr/frs/download.php/file/34099/scotch_6.0.3.tar.gz
wget -P download https://gforge.inria.fr/frs/download.php/file/34703/CGAL-4.6.tar.bz2

Next, we need to unpack the packages we've downloaded:

tar -xzf download/ParaView-v4.1.0-source.tar.gz
tar -xzf download/scotch_6.0.3.tar.gz
tar -xjf download/CGAL-4.6.tar.bz2

And we need to correct some folder names... in this case, it's just ParaView:
```
mv ParaView-v4.1.0 ParaView-4.1.0
```
Last but not least, the final command on this sub-list is to go back to the main OpenFOAM folder:
```
cd ..
```

Optional: Let's make a few symbolic links that should ensure that the correct global MPI installation is used by this OpenFOAM installation:
```
ln -s /usr/bin/mpicc.openmpi OpenFOAM-2.4.x/bin/mpicc
ln -s /usr/bin/mpirun.openmpi OpenFOAM-2.4.x/bin/mpirun
```
This way we avoid having problems in case there is more than one MPI toolbox installed in your Ubuntu system, for example if MPICH2 is installed and is the default MPI toolbox.

For building OpenFOAM itself, it depends on whether you have installed the i686 or x86_64 architecture of Ubuntu. To check this, run:

uname -m

Now, accordingly:

For i686:

#here you can change 4 to the number of cores you've got
source $HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc WM_NCOMPPROCS=4 WM_ARCH_OPTION=32

For x86_64:

#here you can change 4 to the number of cores you've got
source $HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc WM_NCOMPPROCS=4

Save an alias in the personal .bashrc file, simply by running the following command:
```
echo "alias of24x='source \$HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc $FOAM_SETTINGS'" >> $HOME/.bashrc
```
Note: This last line means that whenever you start a new terminal window or tab, you should run the alias command associated to the OpenFOAM 2.4.x shell environment. In other words, whenever you start a new terminal, you should run:
```
of24x
```
For more information on this topic, read section Using aliases to help manage multiple OpenFOAM versions in the page Installation/Working with the Shell.

Now let's build the ThirdParty folder, because we need the shell environment to be updated afterwards, for CGAL to be properly picked up for building OpenFOAM:

cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR
 
#make very certain that the correct Qt version is being used, by running this command:
export QT_SELECT=qt4
 
# This next command will take a while... somewhere between 5 minutes to 30 minutes.
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1
 
#update the shell environment
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS

Now, in order to build ParaView 4.1.0 that comes with OpenFOAM, including with the ability to use Python and MPI, several steps are needed:

First make very certain that the correct Qt version is being used, by running this command:
```
export QT_SELECT=qt4
```

Need to do several fixes:

sed -i -e 's=//#define GLX_GLXEXT_LEGACY=#define GLX_GLXEXT_LEGACY=' \
  ParaView-4.1.0/VTK/Rendering/OpenGL/vtkXOpenGLRenderWindow.cxx
 
cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR/ParaView-4.1.0
 
wget http://www.paraview.org/pipermail/paraview/attachments/20140210/464496cc/attachment.bin -O Fix.patch
patch -p1 < Fix.patch
 
cd VTK
wget https://github.com/gladk/VTK/commit/ef22d3d69421581b33bc0cd94b647da73b61ba96.patch -O Fix2.patch
patch -p1 < Fix2.patch
 
cd ../..

For building ParaView with Python and MPI, it depends on whether you have installed the i686 or x86_64 architecture of Ubuntu. To check this, run:

uname -m

Now, accordingly:

For i686:

#this will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 2 hours or more
./makeParaView4 -python -mpi -python-lib /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpython2.7.so.1.0 > log.makePV 2>&1

For x86_64:

#this will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 2 hours or more
./makeParaView4 -python -mpi -python-lib /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpython2.7.so.1.0 > log.makePV 2>&1

Once the makeParaView4 script is finished running, make sure to check the contents of the file log.makePV and check if there are any errors.
Finally, update the shell environment:
```
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS
```

Now let's build OpenFOAM:
(Warning: this may take somewhere from 30 minutes to 6 hours, depending on your machine.)

#Go into OpenFOAM's main source folder
cd $WM_PROJECT_DIR
 
#Still better be certain that the correct Qt version is being used
export QT_SELECT=qt4
 
# This next command will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 3-6 hours.
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1
 
#Run it a second time for getting a summary of the installation
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1

To check if everything went well:
1. Check if icoFoam is working, by running this command:
```
icoFoam -help
```
  which should tell you something like this:
```
Usage: icoFoam [OPTIONS]
options:
  -case <dir>       specify alternate case directory, default is the cwd
  -noFunctionObjects
                    do not execute functionObjects
  -parallel         run in parallel
  -roots <(dir1 .. dirN)>
                    slave root directories for distributed running
  -srcDoc           display source code in browser
  -doc              display application documentation in browser
  -help             print the usage
```
  Note: And keep in mind that you need to be careful with the letter case of the command. It's icoFoam, not icoFOAM.
2. If the previous command failed to work properly, then edit the file log.make and check if there are any error messages. A few examples on how you can edit this file:
  - By using kwrite:
```
kwrite log.make
```
  - By using gedit:
```
gedit log.make
```
  - By using nano:
```
nano log.make
```
    You can then exit by using the key combination Ctrl+X and following any instructions it gives you.
  Note: It's the first error message that matters.
3. If you don't understand the output, then please compress the log-file log.make and attach the compressed file to a post in the designated thread.
  If you do not know how to create a compressed file, then try one of the following examples:
  - You can compress the file with gzip by running this command:
```
gzip < log.make > log.make.gz
```
    Then attach the resulting package file named log.make.gz to a post in the designated thread.
  - Or you can compress one or more log-files into a tarball package file, by running this command:
```
tar -czf logs.tar.gz log.*
```
    Then attach the resulting package file named logs.tar.gz to a post in the designated thread.
4. Instructions on how to further diagnose the issue yourself, have a look at the section Common errors when building OpenFOAM from source code in the page FAQ/Installation and Running.
Now you can go read the User Guide, where you may have more than one choice:
1. Which you can find a local copy of the User Guide by running the following command:
```
ls -A1 $WM_PROJECT_DIR/doc/Guides*/*UserGuide*.pdf
```
  - You should see two available formats: A4 and US-Letter.
  - But if it instead tells you that there is No such file or directory, then the OpenFOAM environment is possibly not properly activated.
2. You can also find the more recent OpenFOAM Foundation User Guides online at the following page: official OpenFOAM User Guide - but be careful if you use the version that is too much ahead of the version you are currently using, given that some features have changed overtime.
When you need to update your local clone, for getting the latest source code updates, you can follow the instructions provided in the page Installation/Working with git repositories.

Reminder: Whenever you start a new terminal window or tab, you should run the alias command associated to the OpenFOAM 2.4.x shell environment. In other words, run the following command whenever you start a new terminal:

of24x

For more information on this topic, read section Using aliases to help manage multiple OpenFOAM versions in the page Installation/Working with the Shell.

Discussion thread where you can ask questions about these steps: OpenFOAM 2.4.x installation on Ubuntu 14.04: cmake unmet dependency error

2.3 Ubuntu 15.04

Here you have the following choices:

Following the official instructions from here: Repository Release - version 2.4.x
Or by following the detailed step-by-step instructions below...

Discussion thread where you can ask questions about these steps: No thread available. Please a create a new thread in the forum.

Steps:

Switch to root mode (administrator), to install the necessary packages:
```
sudo -s
```
- If the 'sudo' command tells you're not in the sudoers list, then run:
```
su -
```
Update the apt-get cache by running:
```
apt-get update
```

Install the necessary packages:

apt-get install git-core build-essential cmake flex bison zlib1g-dev qt4-dev-tools libqt4-dev libqtwebkit-dev gnuplot \
libreadline-dev libncurses5-dev libxt-dev libopenmpi-dev openmpi-bin libboost-system-dev libboost-thread-dev libgmp-dev \
libmpfr-dev python python-dev

Note: It has been reported that the following should also be executed in some cases, so that ParaView and CGAL will build properly:

apt-get install libglu1-mesa-dev libqt4-opengl-dev

Now exit from the root mode:
```
exit
```

Download and unpack (here you can copy-paste all in single go):

#OpenFOAM downloading and installation
cd ~
mkdir OpenFOAM
cd OpenFOAM
git clone https://github.com/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x.git
git clone https://github.com/OpenFOAM/ThirdParty-2.4.x.git

But we will now have to download a few more of the necessary packages for the ThirdParty-2.4.x folder:

First, we need to prepare for the downloads:
```
cd ThirdParty-2.4.x
mkdir download
```

Now, we need to download the essential source code packages for these instructions you are following (the links are from the file README.org):

wget -P download http://www.paraview.org/files/v4.1/ParaView-v4.1.0-source.tar.gz
wget -P download https://gforge.inria.fr/frs/download.php/file/34099/scotch_6.0.3.tar.gz
wget -P download https://gforge.inria.fr/frs/download.php/file/34703/CGAL-4.6.tar.bz2

Next, we need to unpack the packages we've downloaded:

tar -xzf download/ParaView-v4.1.0-source.tar.gz
tar -xzf download/scotch_6.0.3.tar.gz
tar -xjf download/CGAL-4.6.tar.bz2

And we need to correct some folder names... in this case, it's just ParaView:
```
mv ParaView-v4.1.0 ParaView-4.1.0
```
Last but not least, the final command on this sub-list is to go back to the main OpenFOAM folder:
```
cd ..
```

Optional: Let's make a few symbolic links that should ensure that the correct global MPI installation is used by this OpenFOAM installation:
```
ln -s /usr/bin/mpicc.openmpi OpenFOAM-2.4.x/bin/mpicc
ln -s /usr/bin/mpirun.openmpi OpenFOAM-2.4.x/bin/mpirun
```
This way we avoid having problems in case there is more than one MPI toolbox installed in your Ubuntu system, for example if MPICH2 is installed and is the default MPI toolbox.

For building OpenFOAM itself, it depends on whether you have installed the i686 or x86_64 architecture of Ubuntu. To check this, run:

uname -m

Now, accordingly:

For i686:

#here you can change 4 to the number of cores you've got
source $HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc WM_NCOMPPROCS=4 WM_ARCH_OPTION=32

For x86_64:

#here you can change 4 to the number of cores you've got
source $HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc WM_NCOMPPROCS=4

Save an alias in the personal .bashrc file, simply by running the following command:
```
echo "alias of24x='source \$HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc $FOAM_SETTINGS'" >> $HOME/.bashrc
```
Note: This last line means that whenever you start a new terminal window or tab, you should run the alias command associated to the OpenFOAM 2.4.x shell environment. In other words, whenever you start a new terminal, you should run:
```
of24x
```
For more information on this topic, read section Using aliases to help manage multiple OpenFOAM versions in the page Installation/Working with the Shell.

Now let's build the ThirdParty folder, because we need the shell environment to be updated afterwards, for CGAL to be properly picked up for building OpenFOAM:

cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR
 
#make very certain that the correct Qt version is being used, by running this command:
export QT_SELECT=qt4
 
# This next command will take a while... somewhere between 5 minutes to 30 minutes.
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1
 
#update the shell environment
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS

Now, in order to build ParaView 4.1.0 that comes with OpenFOAM, including with the ability to use Python and MPI, several steps are needed:

First make very certain that the correct Qt version is being used, by running this command:
```
export QT_SELECT=qt4
```

Need to do several fixes:

sed -i -e 's=//#define GLX_GLXEXT_LEGACY=#define GLX_GLXEXT_LEGACY=' \
  ParaView-4.1.0/VTK/Rendering/OpenGL/vtkXOpenGLRenderWindow.cxx
 
cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR/ParaView-4.1.0
 
wget http://www.paraview.org/pipermail/paraview/attachments/20140210/464496cc/attachment.bin -O Fix.patch
patch -p1 < Fix.patch
 
cd VTK
wget https://github.com/gladk/VTK/commit/ef22d3d69421581b33bc0cd94b647da73b61ba96.patch -O Fix2.patch
patch -p1 < Fix2.patch
 
cd ../..

For building ParaView with Python and MPI, it depends on whether you have installed the i686 or x86_64 architecture of Ubuntu. To check this, run:

uname -m

Now, accordingly:

For i686:

#this will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 2 hours or more
./makeParaView4 -python -mpi -python-lib /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpython2.7.so.1.0 > log.makePV 2>&1

For x86_64:

#this will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 2 hours or more
./makeParaView4 -python -mpi -python-lib /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpython2.7.so.1.0 > log.makePV 2>&1

Once the makeParaView4 script is finished running, make sure to check the contents of the file log.makePV and check if there are any errors.
Finally, update the shell environment:
```
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS
```

Now let's build OpenFOAM:
(Warning: this may take somewhere from 30 minutes to 6 hours, depending on your machine.)

#Go into OpenFOAM's main source folder
cd $WM_PROJECT_DIR
 
#Still better be certain that the correct Qt version is being used
export QT_SELECT=qt4
 
# This next command will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 3-6 hours.
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1
 
#Run it a second time for getting a summary of the installation
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1

To check if everything went well:
1. Check if icoFoam is working, by running this command:
```
icoFoam -help
```
  which should tell you something like this:
```
Usage: icoFoam [OPTIONS]
options:
  -case <dir>       specify alternate case directory, default is the cwd
  -noFunctionObjects
                    do not execute functionObjects
  -parallel         run in parallel
  -roots <(dir1 .. dirN)>
                    slave root directories for distributed running
  -srcDoc           display source code in browser
  -doc              display application documentation in browser
  -help             print the usage
```
  Note: And keep in mind that you need to be careful with the letter case of the command. It's icoFoam, not icoFOAM.
2. If the previous command failed to work properly, then edit the file log.make and check if there are any error messages. A few examples on how you can edit this file:
  - By using kwrite:
```
kwrite log.make
```
  - By using gedit:
```
gedit log.make
```
  - By using nano:
```
nano log.make
```
    You can then exit by using the key combination Ctrl+X and following any instructions it gives you.
  Note: It's the first error message that matters.
3. If you don't understand the output, then please compress the log-file log.make and attach the compressed file to a post in the designated thread.
  If you do not know how to create a compressed file, then try one of the following examples:
  - You can compress the file with gzip by running this command:
```
gzip < log.make > log.make.gz
```
    Then attach the resulting package file named log.make.gz to a post in the designated thread.
  - Or you can compress one or more log-files into a tarball package file, by running this command:
```
tar -czf logs.tar.gz log.*
```
    Then attach the resulting package file named logs.tar.gz to a post in the designated thread.
4. Instructions on how to further diagnose the issue yourself, have a look at the section Common errors when building OpenFOAM from source code in the page FAQ/Installation and Running.
Now you can go read the User Guide, where you may have more than one choice:
1. Which you can find a local copy of the User Guide by running the following command:
```
ls -A1 $WM_PROJECT_DIR/doc/Guides*/*UserGuide*.pdf
```
  - You should see two available formats: A4 and US-Letter.
  - But if it instead tells you that there is No such file or directory, then the OpenFOAM environment is possibly not properly activated.
2. You can also find the more recent OpenFOAM Foundation User Guides online at the following page: official OpenFOAM User Guide - but be careful if you use the version that is too much ahead of the version you are currently using, given that some features have changed overtime.
When you need to update your local clone, for getting the latest source code updates, you can follow the instructions provided in the page Installation/Working with git repositories.

Reminder: Whenever you start a new terminal window or tab, you should run the alias command associated to the OpenFOAM 2.4.x shell environment. In other words, run the following command whenever you start a new terminal:

of24x

For more information on this topic, read section Using aliases to help manage multiple OpenFOAM versions in the page Installation/Working with the Shell.

Discussion thread where you can ask questions about these steps: No thread available. Please a create a new thread in the forum.

2.4 Ubuntu 15.10

The instructions written for Ubuntu 15.04 also work in 15.10.

2.5 Ubuntu 16.04

Here you have the following choices:

Following the official instructions from here: Repository Release - version 2.4.x
Or by following the detailed step-by-step instructions below...

Discussion thread where you can ask questions about these steps: Can't find installation instruction for Openfoam 2.4.x , on Ubuntu 16.04

Steps:

Switch to root mode (administrator), to install the necessary packages:
```
sudo -s
```
- If the 'sudo' command tells you're not in the sudoers list, then run:
```
su -
```
Update the apt-get cache by running:
```
apt-get update
```

Install the necessary packages:

apt-get install git-core build-essential cmake flex bison zlib1g-dev qt4-dev-tools libqt4-dev libqtwebkit-dev gnuplot \
libreadline-dev libncurses5-dev libxt-dev libopenmpi-dev openmpi-bin libboost-system-dev libboost-thread-dev libgmp-dev \
libmpfr-dev python python-dev libcgal-dev

Note: It has been reported that the following should also be executed in some cases, so that ParaView and CGAL will build properly:

apt-get install libglu1-mesa-dev libqt4-opengl-dev

Now exit from the root mode:
```
exit
```
Download and unpack (here you can copy-paste all in single go):
```
#OpenFOAM downloading and installation
cd ~
mkdir OpenFOAM
cd OpenFOAM
git clone https://github.com/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x.git
git clone https://github.com/OpenFOAM/ThirdParty-2.4.x.git
```
But we will now have to download a few more of the necessary packages for the ThirdParty-2.4.x folder:
1. First, we need to prepare for the downloads:
```
cd ThirdParty-2.4.x
mkdir download
```
2. Now, we need to download the essential source code packages for these instructions you are following (the links are from the file README.org):
```
wget -P download http://www.paraview.org/files/v4.1/ParaView-v4.1.0-source.tar.gz
wget -P download https://gforge.inria.fr/frs/download.php/file/34099/scotch_6.0.3.tar.gz
```
3. Next, we need to unpack the packages we've downloaded:
```
tar -xzf download/ParaView-v4.1.0-source.tar.gz
tar -xzf download/scotch_6.0.3.tar.gz
```
4. And we need to correct some folder names... in this case, it's just ParaView:
```
mv ParaView-v4.1.0 ParaView-4.1.0
```
5. Last but not least, the final command on this sub-list is to go back to the main OpenFOAM folder:
```
cd ..
```
Since we are going to use CGAL 4.7 that comes with Ubuntu, we are going to configure accordingly by running:
```
sed -i -e 's/^$cgal_version=$.*/\1cgal-system/' OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/config/CGAL.sh
```
Optional: Let's make a few symbolic links that should ensure that the correct global MPI installation is used by this OpenFOAM installation:
```
ln -s /usr/bin/mpicc.openmpi OpenFOAM-2.4.x/bin/mpicc
ln -s /usr/bin/mpirun.openmpi OpenFOAM-2.4.x/bin/mpirun
```
This way we avoid having problems in case there is more than one MPI toolbox installed in your Ubuntu system, for example if MPICH2 is installed and is the default MPI toolbox.

For building OpenFOAM itself, it depends on whether you have installed the i686 or x86_64 architecture of Ubuntu. To check this, run:

uname -m

Now, accordingly:

For i686:

#here you can change 4 to the number of cores you've got
source $HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc WM_NCOMPPROCS=4 WM_ARCH_OPTION=32

For x86_64:

#here you can change 4 to the number of cores you've got
source $HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc WM_NCOMPPROCS=4

Save an alias in the personal .bashrc file, simply by running the following command:
```
echo "alias of24x='source \$HOME/OpenFOAM/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/etc/bashrc $FOAM_SETTINGS'" >> $HOME/.bashrc
```
Note: This last line means that whenever you start a new terminal window or tab, you should run the alias command associated to the OpenFOAM 2.4.x shell environment. In other words, whenever you start a new terminal, you should run:
```
of24x
```
For more information on this topic, read section Using aliases to help manage multiple OpenFOAM versions in the page Installation/Working with the Shell.

Now let's build the ThirdParty folder, because we need the shell environment to be updated afterwards, for CGAL to be properly picked up for building OpenFOAM:

cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR
 
#make very certain that the correct Qt version is being used, by running this command:
export QT_SELECT=qt4
 
# This next command will take a while... somewhere between 5 minutes to 30 minutes.
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1
 
#update the shell environment
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS

Now, in order to build ParaView 4.1.0 that comes with OpenFOAM, including with the ability to use Python and MPI, several steps are needed:

First make very certain that the correct Qt version is being used, by running this command:
```
export QT_SELECT=qt4
```

Need to do several fixes:

sed -i -e 's=//#define GLX_GLXEXT_LEGACY=#define GLX_GLXEXT_LEGACY=' \
  ParaView-4.1.0/VTK/Rendering/OpenGL/vtkXOpenGLRenderWindow.cxx
 
cd $WM_THIRD_PARTY_DIR/ParaView-4.1.0
 
wget http://www.paraview.org/pipermail/paraview/attachments/20140210/464496cc/attachment.bin -O Fix.patch
patch -p1 < Fix.patch
 
cd VTK
wget https://github.com/gladk/VTK/commit/ef22d3d69421581b33bc0cd94b647da73b61ba96.patch -O Fix2.patch
patch -p1 < Fix2.patch
 
cd ../..

For building ParaView with Python and MPI, it depends on whether you have installed the i686 or x86_64 architecture of Ubuntu. To check this, run:

uname -m

Now, accordingly:

For i686:

#this will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 2 hours or more
./makeParaView4 -python -mpi -python-lib /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpython2.7.so.1.0 > log.makePV 2>&1

For x86_64:

#this will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 2 hours or more
./makeParaView4 -python -mpi -python-lib /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpython2.7.so.1.0 > log.makePV 2>&1

Once the makeParaView4 script is finished running, make sure to check the contents of the file log.makePV and check if there are any errors.
Finally, update the shell environment:
```
wmSET $FOAM_SETTINGS
```

Now let's build OpenFOAM:
(Warning: this may take somewhere from 30 minutes to 6 hours, depending on your machine.)

#Go into OpenFOAM's main source folder
cd $WM_PROJECT_DIR
 
#Still better be certain that the correct Qt version is being used
export QT_SELECT=qt4
 
# This next command will take a while... somewhere between 30 minutes to 3-6 hours.
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1
 
#Run it a second time for getting a summary of the installation
./Allwmake > log.make 2>&1

To check if everything went well:
1. Check if icoFoam is working, by running this command:
```
icoFoam -help
```
  which should tell you something like this:
```
Usage: icoFoam [OPTIONS]
options:
  -case <dir>       specify alternate case directory, default is the cwd
  -noFunctionObjects
                    do not execute functionObjects
  -parallel         run in parallel
  -roots <(dir1 .. dirN)>
                    slave root directories for distributed running
  -srcDoc           display source code in browser
  -doc              display application documentation in browser
  -help             print the usage
```
  Note: And keep in mind that you need to be careful with the letter case of the command. It's icoFoam, not icoFOAM.
2. If the previous command failed to work properly, then edit the file log.make and check if there are any error messages. A few examples on how you can edit this file:
  - By using kwrite:
```
kwrite log.make
```
  - By using gedit:
```
gedit log.make
```
  - By using nano:
```
nano log.make
```
    You can then exit by using the key combination Ctrl+X and following any instructions it gives you.
  Note: It's the first error message that matters.
3. If you don't understand the output, then please compress the log-file log.make and attach the compressed file to a post in the designated thread.
  If you do not know how to create a compressed file, then try one of the following examples:
  - You can compress the file with gzip by running this command:
```
gzip < log.make > log.make.gz
```
    Then attach the resulting package file named log.make.gz to a post in the designated thread.
  - Or you can compress one or more log-files into a tarball package file, by running this command:
```
tar -czf logs.tar.gz log.*
```
    Then attach the resulting package file named logs.tar.gz to a post in the designated thread.
4. Instructions on how to further diagnose the issue yourself, have a look at the section Common errors when building OpenFOAM from source code in the page FAQ/Installation and Running.
Now you can go read the User Guide, where you may have more than one choice:
1. Which you can find a local copy of the User Guide by running the following command:
```
ls -A1 $WM_PROJECT_DIR/doc/Guides*/*UserGuide*.pdf
```
  - You should see two available formats: A4 and US-Letter.
  - But if it instead tells you that there is No such file or directory, then the OpenFOAM environment is possibly not properly activated.
2. You can also find the more recent OpenFOAM Foundation User Guides online at the following page: official OpenFOAM User Guide - but be careful if you use the version that is too much ahead of the version you are currently using, given that some features have changed overtime.
When you need to update your local clone, for getting the latest source code updates, you can follow the instructions provided in the page Installation/Working with git repositories.

Reminder: Whenever you start a new terminal window or tab, you should run the alias command associated to the OpenFOAM 2.4.x shell environment. In other words, run the following command whenever you start a new terminal:

of24x

For more information on this topic, read section Using aliases to help manage multiple OpenFOAM versions in the page Installation/Working with the Shell.

Discussion thread where you can ask questions about these steps: Can't find installation instruction for Openfoam 2.4.x , on Ubuntu 16.04

Installation/Linux/OpenFOAM-2.4.x/Ubuntu

1 Introduction

Contents

2 Copy-Paste steps

2.1 Ubuntu 12.04

2.2 Ubuntu 14.04

2.3 Ubuntu 15.04

2.4 Ubuntu 15.10

2.5 Ubuntu 16.04