Need help with Ubuntu setup

[garyterry]

Hi everyone,

I've completed the mechanical build and for the last few days have been battling to get the printer recognised and accessible in ubuntu.

I've searched this forum and the entire net for help with how to set up a rostock max with the ubuntu OS and have come up with a big fat zero of information on how to do so. All the instructions always default to a windows or mac OS without a hint to anything else whatsoever. Even the official documentation shows no reference to any other OS. Giving instructions on how to set up reptier is one thing in ubuntu... which I found on the repetier site, that much have managed, then the documentation just continues with install the windows inf drivers for the usb port but offers no instructions for any other OS. WTF? So my problem is that Ubuntu still doesn't recognise the port or the printer itself and as I'm a relative newb at ubuntu this is proving too much of a hurdle to manage on my own it seems. The real problem is the almost complete lack of documentation for *nix distros despite references to such information being existent on reprap or this forum, I find no such joy via the search on either platform. Maybe I'm just not looking in the right place?

At any rate, help would be greatly appreciated. I'm hoping to print something this weekend if someone can help me with this issue.
I think there should be separate pages on the forum dealing with setup and configuration issues for the 3 principal OS's and not have them all mingled together with confusing references to firmware etc. assuming that if you can setup the firmware on windows the same instructions will somehow work by osmosis on another OS. Rather irritating honestly.

I'll gladly help write up instructions for the Ubuntu OS setup once I've got mine going as this has proved beyond a doubt to be the most irritatingly obscure part of the build for me.

Thanks in advance!

[daftscience]

Windows is the only OS that needs drivers. Linux and OSX work right out of the box, you just need your host software. Do you see the printer in /dev?

**EDIT**

Here is the repetier download page:
http://www.repetier.com/download/
Their site says this:

Linux version
The Linux version requires a recent installation of the Mono framework. After unpacking the tar file you need to run configureFirst.

This should install the mono framework. (i'm not using repetier so I don't have this)

Code: Select all

$sudo apt-get install monodevelop

These are the instructions found in the zip.
If you want more detail go here: http://www.repetier.com/documentation/r ... iguration/

Installation instructions

1. Open a terminal
2. Go to the directory, where you want to have the installation
3. tar -xzf repetierHostLinux.tgz
change tar file accordingly.
4. cd RepetierHost
5. sh configureFirst.sh
6. Make sure your user has permission to use the serial port. On
Debian this requires membership in group dialout. To add a user
into this group enter:
usermod -a -G dialout yourUserName
7. You will be questioned to install dependencies. Answer yes if you are using
a Debian like distribution (Ubuntu, Mint, ...). This will most probably di
all work needed, to get it running.

After that, you have a link in /usr/bin so you can start the host from
everywhere with

repetierHost

Known issues:
- You may see an OpenGL warning at startup. Ignore it.
- Sometimes the start fails. Just start again.

First steps:
Create a workdir under Config->Repetier settings
Configure printer
Configure your slicer. Slic3r should work out of the box. Just adjust the
slicing parameter to you likes.
If you want to use Skeinforge, install it and configure the path to Skeinforge.

Your printer will be something like /dev/ttyAMC0. what you can do is unplug it and type

Code: Select all

$ cd /dev
$ ls

Then plug you're printer in and send the LS command again and look for the new device.



I hope that helps. There is no documentation because the RostockMax is pretty new, and most people use windows or mac. Starting out on linux can seem pretty daunting. Good luck.


Tom

[garyterry]

Thanks daftscience,

I had mono installed and all the other dependencies... that wasn't the problem. I ran the configurefirst script and all was well... repetierHost up and running... smiles all around... so I looked in dev/ for the rostock but there are like 60 or more tty "printers" or port drivers or whatever they are in that directory.... I went through like 30 of them testing one then another... I just got error after error and after the first 20 or so I just started losing it. So I came to the forum for some friendly advice.

Thanks for providing that little key bit of info that I was missing. The NAME of the bloody port! LOL! I've seen /dev/ttyAMC0 so I'll give it a try now. Hopefully I'll manage after that. Thanks for all your help! I knew it would be more difficult with ubuntu... but it's important to me that the movement towards decentralised manufacturing is on open source hardware AND software and freely accessible to everyone and not just those who can afford to maintain expensive OS's... hence the change of OS from the start. If it isn't difficult it isn't worth doing... hehe!

Thanks again for your help...
Gary

[daftscience]

Thanks daftscience,
If it isn't difficult it isn't worth doing... hehe!

heheh You're going to find this is to very very very worth doing. There are a lot of really helpful people here so that should make it easier. I went from never seeing a 3d printer to having an almost fully calibrated instrument in 3 weeks thanks to everyone here.


Tom