CIS 565 - Setup instructions for your Linux PC

Setup your Linux Computer

Follow this guide to setup your personal Linux computer.

This guide assumes that you have root access to your computer.

1. Install basic C/C++ compilation tools (gcc, g++, make etc.) installed. For Debian/Ubuntu, we recommend the build-essential package.
2. Install git using package manager. Example sudo apt install git on Debian/Ubuntu.
   • After installation, follow the First Time Git Setup Guide if this is the first time you are using Git.
3. Install CUDA 11. You can either use the downloaded version or your package manager. Install the NVIDIA Driver if it is newer than the installed version. Make sure you also install Nsight.
4. Install Nsight Compute, Nsight Graphics, and Nsight Systems from https://developer.nvidia.com/nsight-tools-visual-studio-integration.
5. Install CMake (sudo apt install cmake on Debian/Ubuntu).
6. Install glfw and glew (apt install libglfw3-dev libglew-dev on Debian/Ubuntu).
7. (Recommended) Nsight is a debugging and profiling tool shipped with CUDA. We recommend adding the CUDA executables to your PATH using export PATH=/usr/local/cuda/bin/:${PATH}. Note that using the export command is a temporary change through the life of the terminal. For permanent change, add it to your shell configuration file, e.g. ~/.bashrc on Ubuntu). You can run then run Nsight by typing nsight in your terminal.

Enable GPU Performance Counters

When running profiling, the Nsight tools need access to systems level counters to trace the performance. This can be done using running the app as root using sudo, or setting the CAP_SYS_ADMIN capability set. For detailed instructions, follow NVIDIA Documentation.

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