Install Poppy software
If you want to install the board of a real robot, go to the startup chapter instead.
This section will guide you to install Poppy software on your personal computer. It is useful only if you are in one of these situations:
- You want to control a simulated robot.
- You want to control a Poppy creature from your computer without using the embedded board (Raspberry Pi).
Poppy creatures are run by Python computer code. Depending on your operating system you will have to install Python and in any case you'll have to install the required software libraries.
1. Install Python...
...on Windows
Download and install the last version of Python for Windows (x86-64 executable installer). Make sure you activate the checkbox Add Python to PATH during installation, otherwise Windows wouldn't find Python in the next steps.
Poppy software libraries work with Python 3.5.x and later. Anaconda and Python 2.x.x are no longer supported starting from pypot >= 4.0.0.
...on GNU/Linux (Ubuntu, Fedora, Archlinux...)
Most of GNU/Linux distributions are already equipped with Python, thus you can just go ahead. Just replace all pip commands by pip3, that will enforce the use of Python 3 since some distributions still work with Python 2 as well.
2. Install Poppy software
Now Python is installed in you Operating System, let's install the Poppy software. Open the Windows shell (aka cmd) from your Windows menu. In the terminal (the black screen), type the command below and press Enter to execute it:
pip install poppy-ergo-jr
This command tells Python to install the package corresponding to the Popppy Ergo Jr robot. Substitute "poppy-ergo-jr" with "poppy-torso" or "poppy-humanoid" to install respectively a Poppy Torso or a Poppy Humanoid.
Info If an error tells you that pip is not recognized or not found, your Python installation probably failed in the previous step. Make it again.
Upgrade Poppy software
Skip this step if this is your first install. In case of update, it is advised to upgrade pypot (the motor library control) and the creature package separately:
Substitute "poppy-ergo-jr" with "poppy-torso" or "poppy-humanoid" to install respectively a Poppy Torso or a Poppy Humanoid.
pip install pypot --upgrade --no-deps
pip install poppy-ergo-jr --upgrade --no-deps
To understand commands above
- --upgrade will uninstall before starting the install
- --no-deps will avoid installing dependencies, this is usefull to avoid pip to compile scipy as it will probably fail of you have not GCC and Fortran dependencies.
You're done!
If you followed steps 1 and 2 and met no specific error during the process, you successfully installed Python libraries for Poppy robot on your computer.
You can then start Poppy services on your computer to program with Scratch or connect to the robot via Python.
However, if your robot is brand new, you will need first to configure motors one-by-one before you can program in Scratch or Python.