How to install glmark2 from source in Debian

Glmark2 is a popular open source GPU benchmarking tool with OpenGL  2.0 and OpenGLES 2.0 support, available for Linux and Android platform.

It is developed with a goal of easy and effective GPU benchmarking for ARM hardware in embedded systems by the Linaro team.

Glmark2 binary packages are available in official Ubuntu repository, but not available in Debian repository, so we have to compile and install latest glmark2 form its git repository.

Install required softwares and development headers

To Download and compile latest debian glmark2 binary, we need some basic tools like g++ and git and development libraries.

1. Build a basic binary compilation environment

   sudo apt-get install git g++ build-essential pkg-config

2. Build a X11 and OpenGL development environment

   sudo apt-get install libx11-dev libgl1-mesa-dev

3. Install jpeg and png image development headers

   sudo apt-get install libjpeg-dev libpng-dev       # install libpng12-dev on Ubuntu/Mint

Download glmark2 source from git

Now you can download the glmark2 source files either with git or the source zip file from glmark github website https://github.com/glmark2/glmark2 .

cd ~/

git clone https://github.com/glmark2/glmark2.git

cd glmark2/

Configure, compile and install glmark2 in Debian

Glmark2 uses the python based WAF build system, which requires an working python 2.x installation, now we are going to build debian glmark2 with X11 and opneGL support only, no OpenGLES, wayland or mir support.

./waf configure --with-flavors=x11-gl

./waf build -j 4

sudo ./waf install

Stripping the debian glmark2 binary will reduce the overall binary size hence it will  make the application launch faster.

sudo strip -s /usr/local/bin/glmark2

Now the compilation and installation is complete , run glmark2 and check the results.

glmark2

Note: This will bulid the glmark2 binary and all the supporting data and supporting library under the build/src/ directory.

The default build prefix is /usr/local/ and it will be installed there. So the installation process requires root privilege. Checkout the main article about GPU benchmarking with glmark2 here .

Fix libpng error while configuring

This step is optional, depending on your system, but in my case with Debain testing, it was necessary fix this problem.

sudo mv /usr/include/png.h /usr/include/png.h.bac

cd ~/glmark2/src/libpng/

sudo cp png.h /usr/include/

cd ~/glmark2

Conclusion

Actually this installation process is pretty easy, but sometimes returns many error messages due to improper library and header files.

So if there is any error during configuring and compilation process, you have to find out and solve it, if you need any further help just leave a comment and 🙂 dont forget to share it.