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| '''NOTE! This article documents an [[current event]]. Information may change rapidly as the event progresses.'''
| | {{mininav| [[Development]] {{l2| [[Linux]] }} }} |
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| Currently, a few developers on [[Team-XBMC]] have begun porting XBMC to Linux (and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenGL OpenGL] using the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_DirectMedia_Layer SDL toolkit]). The goal is for this to become a full port of XBMC with all the same [[XBMC Features and Supported Formats/Codecs|features and functions that are available on the Xbox version of XBMC]]. This is a huge task which is why we are now making this public request, seeking [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programming_language C/C++ programmers] who may or may not yet have already contributed to [http://sourceforge.net/projects/xbmc The XBMC Project] in the past to volunteer in assisting us with this Linux porting development project. Those unfamiliar to XBMC can get a good overview of what XBMC is capable of by reading the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XBMC XBMC article on wikipedia.org]
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| | {{Kodi_development_nav}} |
| | <section begin="intro" />Team Kodi (formerly called Team-XBMC) first ported XBMC Media Center software to Linux in 2007, and the whole project cross-platform application was renamed to Kodi in 2014. Kodi itself is a huge open source project and it takes loads of people working together to maintain it for all platforms, that is why Team-Kodi is always on the lookout for C/C++ programmers to volunteer in assisting us with the development of Kodi. Whether you have contributed to the Kodi/XBMC project in the past or not, please consider doing so now.<section end="intro" /> |
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| :'''Note to XBMC end-users!''' Please understand that this XBMC Linux port project is not yet mature enough for you to play with. No media can even be played back yet and we can not give you an ETA when it will be useful for end-users. Respect that we can not yet accept any bug reports or feature/function requests for this Linux port. If you as an end-users have any questions or need to get something of your chest about this then please direct that towards the existing [http://www.xboxmediacenter.com/forum/showthread.php?t=26097 XBMC Linux port end-user discussion topic-thread in our community-forum]
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| ==What is XBMC and why port it to Linux?== | | == End-users (non-programmers) == |
| For those who does not know; '''XBMC''' (short for '''XB'''ox '''M'''edia '''C'''enter, not to confused with [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Media_Center_Extender Microsoft's Windows Media Center Extender for the Xbox]) is an award-winning free and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source open source] media player, originally designed to run on the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox Xbox game-console]. The GPL/LGPL licensed source code basically consist of a GUI framework that has been written from scratch by [[Team-XBMC]], this GUI acts as a front-end control interface for several audio/video players designed for specific purposes (and those are loaded when needed as DLLs), the GUI is also the interface to [[XBMC Features and Supported Formats/Codecs|all of XBMC multimedia handling functions such as databases and sorting, etc.]]. [http://sourceforge.net/projects/xbmc The XBMC Project], (who's members maintain XBMC source code), is a non-profit open source hobby project that is developed by volunteers in their spare-time without any monetary gain. The team of developers working on XBMC have always encouraged anyone to submit your own source code patches for new [[XBMC_Features_and_Supported_Formats/Codecs|features or functions]], improve on existing ones, or fix bugs.
| | You can help too by downloading Kodi for Linux, testing it, and [[HOW-TO:Submit_a_bug_report|reporting bugs and issues]]. Also, spread the word about Kodi for Linux(and other platforms) to your friends and family, we are sure they will enjoy it too. |
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| The difference this time is that we are not asking for new [[XBMC_Features_and_Supported_Formats/Codecs|features/functions]], what we are asking is for the existing code to be ported so it will compile and run under a Linux operating-system (with the same [[XBMC_Features_and_Supported_Formats/Codecs|features/functions]] that are already available on the Xbox version of XBMC). The main reasons for porting XBMC to Linux are non-technical, (so it is not that the Xbox hardware is too slow or to old for the XBMC GUI or its existing [[XBMC_Features_and_Supported_Formats/Codecs|features/functions]]), the real reasons are that we want XBMC to get a larger end-user and developer-base, because the more people who use XBMC and help maintain the code (and skins) the longer the project will grow and stay alive. The main reason from an end-user point of view is that the Xbox can not playback native high-definition video (at 720p and 1080i/1080p), especially not if the video is encoded with a H.264 or VC-1 codec. Nevertheless, note that we will still keep the old Xbox as the reference platform for standard-definition resolution video for a few more years, meaning that the same GUI (and skins) that runs smooth under Linux on a relativly new computer must also run just as smooth on the old Xbox hardware (or a old computer that matches the Xbox hardware).
| | == Developers (programmers) == |
| | You should be proficient in [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programming_language C/C++ programming language], and although not really required knowledge of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenGL OpenGL] or other [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multimedia multimedia] programming is a plus, as well as prior [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-platform cross-platform] or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porting porting] development experience. |
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| | == Where do I start on Linux? == |
| | General and distribution specific guides on HOW-TO compile Kodi for Linux from source code is available in this whis, and there is also an up-to-date README for Ubuntu Linux available in the [https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc XBMC Foundation git repo on GitHub]. |
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| ==Skill requirements and where to start==
| | The recommended '''Linux development platform''' is currently [[Compiling_Kodi|32-bit Ubuntu Desktop (for x86)]]. The code can be obtained by cloning the xbmc [http://git-scm.com/ git] repository hosted on [https://github.com/xbmc/xbmc Github]. First use your package manager to install git on your system and then execute the following command to clone your own repository: <br /> |
| Proficient in [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programming_language C/C++ programming language], and though not required knowledge of DirectX, OpenGL and/or multimedia is a plus, as well as prior [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-platform cross-platform] or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Porting porting] development experience. You do not need to have access to an Xbox game-console or any special tools/softwares in order to take part - XBMC development is well underway on [http://www.ubuntu.com Linux (Ubuntu 7.04)].
| | <br /><code> |
| | git clone git://github.com/xbmc/xbmc.git |
| | </code><br /> |
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| | After the clone has completed, follow the compilation/development guide in the new repository ([[Compiling_Kodi|README.linux]]) to setup the required packages and so on. Team-XBMC developers opinion is that the best thing to start with is just to take a look through the source code and try to understand how it all fits together. Test things out, find what works and what does not, then try and track down why. |
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| ====Where do I start (Linux)?====
| | Alternatively, you can [https://www.virtualbox.org/wiki/Downloads download VirtualBox] and follow this guide to install the required software: [[Compiling_Kodi|Ubuntu Desktop (32-bit for x86)]]. Besides from KDevelop, additional development tools that can be useful include Subcommander, Doxygen, Sysprof and PowerTop. |
| The recommended '''Linux development platform''' is currently [http://www.ubuntu.com Ubuntu 7.04 (Feisty Fawn)]. There is a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kdevelop Kdevelop] project file available in SVN. After you done a [http://sourceforge.net/svn/?group_id=87054 SVN] checkout, follow the install guide in the SVN to setup the required packages and so on. The best thing to do is just take a look through the source code and try to understand how it all fits together. Test things out, find what works and what does not, then try and track down why.
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| ====Non-Linux developers can also help====
| | The performance of a virtual machine is not great, as there is no 3D hardware acceleration support under a virtual machine, however it should work good enough to get a lot of development tasks done. Nice is also that you can install/run [https://www.virtualbox.org/ VirtualBox] on Windows, OS X and Linux. The free VirtualBox also enables you to share data seamlessly between the virtual machine and host computer, and also allows you to directly access USB 2.0 devices from within the virtual machine. To improve the performance of your virtual machine, you can increase the number of cores on a multi-core system that is assigned to your virtual machine. |
| XBMC can also be compiled for [http://www.xboxmediacenter.com/forum/showthread.php?t=23235 Win32 (Microsoft Windows) operating-systems] with [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Visual_Studio Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 2003 (7.1) or higher], so even though Team-XBMC will be concentrating on the Linux port of XBMC, it will not hurt if some people who prefer [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Visual_Studio Microsoft Visual Studio] as a developement platform volunteer to help with getting the [http://www.xboxmediacenter.com/forum/showthread.php?t=23235 Win32 port of XBMC] up to par as well, as a preperation for possible future cross-platform versions of XBMC.
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| * [[HOW-TO compile XBMC for Win32 from source code]] (to come soon!)
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| ==Other tools and resources== | | === Hardware requirements === |
| Though any other tools or resources are not required they can possible help make in development.
| | * [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X86 x86-based computer] (if you don't know what it means, you probably have one). No special hardware is required for development, as developers can compile using the "''make sdl_2d option''" (see [[Compiling_Kodi|README.linux]]). However for end-users the recommended minimum requirement is a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_Processing_Unit 3D GPU (Graphics Processing Unit)] that at least supports [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shader_model Shader Model 3.0] and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenGL OpenGL 2.0] (that features 24bpp or 32bpp for 3D hardware-acceleration support, which the XBMC GUI needs to run smoothly at an acceptable frame-rate). Graphic adapters that support [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DirectX DirectX version 9.0c] or later usually meet all of those mentioned requirements, (Team Kodi recommends [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nvidia NVIDIA GeForce 6150 or later] as NVIDIA is currently the manufacturer that offers [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graphics_hardware_and_FOSS good device-drivers for Linux] (and [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nvidia NVIDIA GeForce 6150 or later] supports OpenGL 2.0). |
| * [http://valgrind.org Valgrind] - free Linux programming tool for memory debugging, memory leak detection, and profiling.
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| * [http://www.daimi.au.dk/~sandmann/sysprof/ Sysprof] - free System-wide Linux Profiler for tracking CPU usage
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| ==Technical summery of XBMC==
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| ===The basics===
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| The XBMC code structure uses a fairly modular design (with libraries and DLLs), and we think that there are enough modules/libraries to keep a wide skill-level range of developers busy for a while in the porting of them all. So please, take a look at the source code, then with the help of our To-Do list (futher down in this article) assess where the porting stage is today and think about where and how you can try to help out. Note that we are not planning on completly abandoning the Xbox hardware any time soon - XBMC will be a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-platform cross-platform] software application, using the same code on multiple hardware platforms, (the old Xbox do have a good amount of years left to live).
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| ===Detailed technical information===
| | [[Category:Development]] |
| For more details please visit the [[Development Notes]] section on this manual.
| | [[Category:Linux]] |
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| ===The XBMC source code===
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| The XBMC source code is in our SVN repository on sourceforge.net. Full instructions for compiling/builing XBMC under Linux is available here:
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| * [[HOW-TO compile XBMC for Linux from source code]]
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| ==Linux porting==
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| ===The Linux port plan===
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| * Milestone 1 - Get all existing XBMC functionality working as it worked on XBMC
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| * Milestone 2 - Add linux specific items (network settings, packaging, etc)
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| ===What has already been done===
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| *[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kdevelop Kdevelop]] project file available in SVN
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| **Linux development and debug environment
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| *Code fully compiles on Ubuntu 7.04
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| *GUI implementation of [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_DirectMedia_Layer SDL]
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| **OpenGL/SDL - using the GPU, working but relies on an accelerated OpenGL version
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| **SDL using 2D blitting, working but relies on computer CPU, not recommended
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| *Picture viewing working (including slideshow and it's effects)
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| *SMB network shares
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| *Paplayer and it's DLLs - in progress
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| ==To-Do==
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| This is a '''To-Do list''' of thing that still need to be done, you are more than welcome to help out with any of these tasks:
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| * [MAJOR - HIGH PRORITY] PAPlayer porting to Linux (port DLLs to SO, support ALSA) - in progress
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| * [MAJOR - HIGH PRORITY] MPlayer porting to Linux
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| * [MAJOR - HIGH PRORITY] DVDplayer porting to Linux
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| * [MAJOR - HIGH PRORITY] [[Rendering|Pixel Shader video renderer(s)]] (possibly also hardware overlay via [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_video_extension Xv])
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| * [MAJOR - HIGH PRIORITY] Python scripts - in early stages
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| * [MAJOR - HIGH PRIORITY] CD-ROM/DVD-ROM support (ripping, ISO 9660, UDF, etc)
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| * [MAJOR - MEDIUM PRIORITY] Development of a platform-independent wrapper interface to DirectX / OpenGL / SDL graphics interfaces, particularly with respect to how this interface should be exported to visualisations (.vis) and screensavers (.xscr), etc.
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| * [MAJOR - MEDIUM PRIORITY] Development of a platform-independent wrapper interface to DirectX / ALSA /OSS / SDL audio interfaces.
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| * [MAJOR - MEDIUM PRIORITY] Network: Servers (FTP, Web, UPnP), Clients (FTP, Time), Network settings
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| * [MAJOR - MEDIUM PRIORITY] Support USB disks dynamically (meaning, inserted/removed after boot)
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| * [MAJOR - MEDIUM PRIORITY] WMA codec for PAPlayer
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| * [MAJOR - MEDIUM PRIORITY] Port milkdrop and possibly other visualizations
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| * [MAJOR - MEDIUM PRIORITY] Screen savers. Possibly use GNOME or other open source ones.
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| * [MAJOR - LOW PRORITY] Credits
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| * [MAJOR - LOW PRORITY] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XvMC XvMC] and/or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shader_model Pixel Shader (Shader Model 3.0)] or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cg_programming_language Cg] video hardware acceleration.
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| **[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purevideo#PureVideo NVIDIA PureVideo technology] support via XvMC will be great using NVIDIA's closed-source device driver as NVIDIA GPUs have a dedicated programable video acceleration core, however those closed-source device driver only support MPEG-2 video acceleration even though NVIDIA GeForce 7 GPU hardware and later support hardware acceleration of H.264 and VC-1 (WMV9) as well. So unless you have the skill/knowledge to add full XvMC support to the open source NVIDIA deveice drivers then we either have to wait for NVIDIA to support XvMC for MPEG-4 under Linux, or we can add hardware acceleration support by writting [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shader_model pixel shaders] using [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GLSL GLSL] or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cg_programming_language Cg] (or [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lib_Sh Lib Sh]) code for the decoding processes we can to offload some of the decoding onto the GPU, (which even though not as effective as using the NVIDIA PureVideo will be better than nothing).
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| * [MINOR - HIGH PRORITY] Fix hacks which might not work on some platforms
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| * [MINOR - MEDIUM PRORITY] [http://www.lirc.org Lirc] or alternative implementation for IR/IrDA (infrared) remote support under Linux
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| **Also add [http://winlirc.sourceforge.net Wlirc] for IR/IrDA (infrared) remote support under Win32 for consistency.
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| **Though probably not possible, it would be great if could be added via [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simple_DirectMedia_Layer SDL] for platform-independence.
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| * [CLEANUP - ALWAYS AN ONGOING PROCESS] Document all of the current/existing code (DocBook, rst, or [http://www.doxygen.org doxygen], preferably the latter)
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| * [CLEANUP - ALWAYS AN ONGOING PROCESS] [http://valgrind.org/ Valgrid] debugging under Linux (and back-port any fixes to the Xbox and Win32 code)
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| ==XBMC programming and code formatting convention guidelines==
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| More to come based on this ongoing discussion => [http://www.xboxmediacenter.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5238 Proposed code formatting conventions for XBMC ]
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| * Code documentation (DocBook, rst, or [http://www.doxygen.org doxygen] for the code documentation steps, preferably the latter, [http://www.doxygen.org doxygen])
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| * Modular design (independent modules made upp by localized/isolated code libraries without dependcies)
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| * XBMC should still compile and run if a module is disabled/removed
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| * Cross-platform/multi-platform support; aim to compile and run on at least, Xbox, Linux, and Win32 (Microsoft Windows)
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| * Aim for the GUI/interface to run smoothly on a low spec computer (less than 1Ghz)
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| * Avoid harddisk trashing (excess read/write/erase cycles), utilize RAM memory, no harddrive paging. Aim to run on Solid-State (CompactFlash)
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| * Fast load and boot times for end-user perception (other thing can still run/start in the background without the user knowledge)
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| **15-seconds or less from when the end user press the power-button on the computer til he/she can browse the GUI
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| ==Mentors==
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| Mentors are developers from [[Team XBMC and Others|Team-XBMC]] and members of [http://sourceforge.net/projects/xbmc The XBMC Project] that have volunteered to assist and mentor non-official XBMC developers in any non-trivial way they can, helping you by checking, commenting and commiting your code patches to our SVN source code tree. These mentors have chosen an area they prefer to specialize in, usually this is an area in which they feel they have most interest, knowledge, and expertise in. Initial [[HOW-TO submit a patch|patches are welcome]], and can and will be merged by the team. If you wish to [[Apply to join the Official XBMC Development-Team|join the team in an official capacity]], please let us know.
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| ====Linux post mentors:====
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| * [[User:Yuvalt|Yuvalt]]: Everything Linux
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| * [[User:Elupus|Elupus]]: DllLoader, Mplayer and DVDPlayer
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| * [[User:Spiff|Spiff]]: Anything other than DllLoader/MPlayer/DVDPlayer internals.
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| * [[User:Jmarshall|JMarshall]]: Anything GUI related, Music Library, Video Library, PAPlayer, etc.
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| '''Note! If you are a C/C++ porting guru/expert and like volunteer as a 'third-party developer mentor' then please let us know.
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| ==Contact methods==
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| * IRC: [irc://irc.freenode.net/xbmc #xbmc on freenode]
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| * [http://www.xboxmediacenter.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=10 Development XBMC Development Forum]
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| **Developers forum for XBMC development. Programmers/Coders only!
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| **Not for posting Feature Requests or end-user support requests!
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| * [[HOW-TO submit a patch]]
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| [[category:Current events]]
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| [[category:Inner Workings]]
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| [[category:Development]]
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| [[category:Skin Development]]
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| [[category:Linux]]
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| [[category:To-Do]]
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This page or section may require cleanup, updating, spellchecking, reformatting and/or updated images. Please improve this page if you can. The discussion page may contain suggestions.
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Team Kodi (formerly called Team-XBMC) first ported XBMC Media Center software to Linux in 2007, and the whole project cross-platform application was renamed to Kodi in 2014. Kodi itself is a huge open source project and it takes loads of people working together to maintain it for all platforms, that is why Team-Kodi is always on the lookout for C/C++ programmers to volunteer in assisting us with the development of Kodi. Whether you have contributed to the Kodi/XBMC project in the past or not, please consider doing so now.
End-users (non-programmers)
You can help too by downloading Kodi for Linux, testing it, and reporting bugs and issues. Also, spread the word about Kodi for Linux(and other platforms) to your friends and family, we are sure they will enjoy it too.
Developers (programmers)
You should be proficient in C/C++ programming language, and although not really required knowledge of OpenGL or other multimedia programming is a plus, as well as prior cross-platform or porting development experience.
Where do I start on Linux?
General and distribution specific guides on HOW-TO compile Kodi for Linux from source code is available in this whis, and there is also an up-to-date README for Ubuntu Linux available in the XBMC Foundation git repo on GitHub.
The recommended Linux development platform is currently 32-bit Ubuntu Desktop (for x86). The code can be obtained by cloning the xbmc git repository hosted on Github. First use your package manager to install git on your system and then execute the following command to clone your own repository:
git clone git://github.com/xbmc/xbmc.git
After the clone has completed, follow the compilation/development guide in the new repository (README.linux) to setup the required packages and so on. Team-XBMC developers opinion is that the best thing to start with is just to take a look through the source code and try to understand how it all fits together. Test things out, find what works and what does not, then try and track down why.
Alternatively, you can download VirtualBox and follow this guide to install the required software: Ubuntu Desktop (32-bit for x86). Besides from KDevelop, additional development tools that can be useful include Subcommander, Doxygen, Sysprof and PowerTop.
The performance of a virtual machine is not great, as there is no 3D hardware acceleration support under a virtual machine, however it should work good enough to get a lot of development tasks done. Nice is also that you can install/run VirtualBox on Windows, OS X and Linux. The free VirtualBox also enables you to share data seamlessly between the virtual machine and host computer, and also allows you to directly access USB 2.0 devices from within the virtual machine. To improve the performance of your virtual machine, you can increase the number of cores on a multi-core system that is assigned to your virtual machine.
Hardware requirements
Development