SimpleScreenRecorder

SimpleScreenRecorder is a screen recorder for Linux. Despite the name, this program is actually quite complex. It's 'simple' in the sense that it's easier to use than ffmpeg/avconv or VLC :).

There is a separate repository for SimpleScreenRecorder packages: https://github.com/MaartenBaert/ssr-packages

License

GNU GPL v3 - read 'COPYING' for more info.

Build dependencies

If you have a 64-bit system, you have to install some 32-bit libraries as well. These are required to compile the 32-bit SSR-GLInject library (which is needed to record 32-bit OpenGL applications).

You will need the following packages to compile SimpleScreenRecorder:

• GCC (>= 4.6) and make
• pkg-config
• Qt 4 (Qt 5 is also possible, but still has some stability issues)
• ffmpeg or libav (libavformat, libavcodec, libavutil, libswscale)
• ALSA library
• PulseAudio library (optional, disable with --without-pulseaudio)
• JACK library (optional, disable with --without-jack)
• libGL (32 and 64 bit)
• libGLU (32 and 64 bit)
• libX11 (32 and 64 bit)
• libXfixes (32 and 64 bit)
• libXext
• libXi

For Ubuntu 12.04 - 13.04:

sudo apt-get install build-essential pkg-config qt4-qmake libqt4-dev libavformat-dev \
libavcodec-dev libavutil-dev libswscale-dev libasound2-dev libpulse-dev libjack-jackd2-dev \
libgl1-mesa-dev libglu1-mesa-dev libx11-dev libxfixes-dev libxext-dev libxi-dev g++-multilib ia32-libs

For Ubuntu 13.10 - 15.10:

sudo apt-get install build-essential pkg-config qt4-qmake libqt4-dev libavformat-dev \
libavcodec-dev libavutil-dev libswscale-dev libasound2-dev libpulse-dev libjack-jackd2-dev \
libgl1-mesa-dev libglu1-mesa-dev libx11-dev libxfixes-dev libxext-dev libxi-dev g++-multilib \
libx11-6:i386 libxfixes3:i386 libglu1-mesa:i386

If the 32-bit version of some library isn't found, but 64-bit works fine, try this:

# if you are using open-source drivers:
cd /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu
sudo ln -s libGL.so.1 mesa/libGL.so
sudo ln -s mesa/libGL.so libGL.so
sudo ln -s mesa/libGL.so.1 libGL.so.1

# if you are using the proprietary AMD drivers:
# first figure out where the fglrx directory is located,
# this can be /usr/lib32 or /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu
cd /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu
sudo ln -s libGL.so.1 fglrx/libGL.so
sudo ln -s fglrx/libGL.so libGL.so
sudo ln -s fglrx/libGL.so.1 libGL.so.1

# if you are using the proprietary NVIDIA drivers:
# first figure out where the nvidia directory is located,
# this can be /usr/lib32 or /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu
cd /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu
sudo ln -s libGL.so.1 nvidia*/libGL.so
sudo ln -s nvidia*/libGL.so libGL.so
sudo ln -s nvidia*/libGL.so.1 libGL.so.1

# for all drivers:
cd /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu
sudo ln -s libGLU.so.1 libGLU.so
sudo ln -s libX11.so.6 libX11.so
sudo ln -s libXext.so.6 libXext.so
sudo ln -s libXfixes.so.3 libXfixes.so
sudo ldconfig

I don't know whether this is the right way to do it, but it works for me. If you are using a combination of open-source and proprietary drivers (e.g. for laptops with Intel + NVIDIA GPUs a.k.a. 'Optimus'), follow only the steps for the open-source drivers.

For Debian:

sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install build-essential pkg-config qt4-qmake libqt4-dev libavformat-dev \
libavcodec-dev libavutil-dev libswscale-dev libasound2-dev libpulse-dev libjack-jackd2-dev \
libgl1-mesa-dev libglu1-mesa-dev libx11-dev libxfixes-dev libxext-dev libxi-dev g++-multilib \
libx11-6 libxext6 libxfixes3 \
libglu1-mesa-dev:i386 libx11-dev:i386 libxfixes-dev:i386 libgl1-mesa-dev:i386 \
desktop-file-utils

cd /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu
sudo ln -s libGL.so.1 libGL.so
sudo ln -s libGLU.so.1 libGLU.so
sudo ln -s libX11.so.6 libX11.so
sudo ln -s libXext.so.6 libXext.so
sudo ln -s libXfixes.so.3 libXfixes.so
sudo ldconfig

For OpenSUSE (incomplete list but usually enough):

sudo zypper install gcc gcc-32bit libffmpeg-devel libqt4-devel libpulse-devel libjack-devel \
glu-devel glu-devel-32bit libX11-devel libX11-devel-32bit libXfixes-devel libXfixes-devel-32bit \
libXext-devel libXi-devel libstdc++47-devel-32bit

cd /usr/lib/i386-linux-gnu
sudo ln -s libGLU.so.1 libGLU.so
sudo ln -s libX11.so.6 libX11.so
sudo ln -s libXext.so.6 libXext.so
sudo ln -s libXfixes.so.3 libXfixes.so
sudo ldconfig

Some packages (e.g. ffmpeg) are not in the official repository, but can be installed from the Packman repository. You can add the Packman repository with this command:

zypper addrepo -f http://ftp.gwdg.de/pub/linux/packman/suse/12.3/ packman

For Fedora:

sudo yum install ffmpeg-devel qt4-devel alsa-lib-devel pulseaudio-libs-devel jack-audio-connection-kit-devel \
gcc make gcc-c++ glibc-devel.i686 libgcc.i686 libX11-devel libX11-devel.i686 libXext-devel libXext-devel.i686 \
libXfixes-devel libXfixes-devel.i686 mesa-libGL-devel mesa-libGL-devel.i686 mesa-libGLU-devel mesa-libGLU-devel.i686 \
mesa-libGLU-devel.x86_64 qt4

Some packages (e.g. ffmpeg) are not in the official repository, but can be installed from the RPM Fusion repository. You can add the RPM Fusion repository with this command:

rpm -Uvh http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/rpmfusion-free-release-stable.noarch.rpm \
http://download1.rpmfusion.org/nonfree/fedora/rpmfusion-nonfree-release-stable.noarch.rpm

Compiling and installing

If you have installed SimpleScreenRecorder as a package from a repository, you should uninstall that version first to avoid conflicts. If you don't do this, the two versions may overwrite each other or use the wrong version of the GLInject library.

The simplest way to compile and install everything is to run:

./simple-build-and-install

This will compile the 64-bit main program and library, and then the 32-bit library. If the 32-bit build fails because libraries are missing, but 64-bit works fine, read the instructions above again :).

If you want to compile step-by-step, just run configure followed by make. Configure with --disable-ffmpeg-versions if your distribution uses libav instead of ffmpeg. It's a good idea to build in a separate directory, because you will need to build the library twice (32-bit and 64-bit). Look at the 'simple-build-and-install' script to see how this is done.

You don't need to install the program to use it, but installing will give you a desktop entry and an icon. Also, if you don't install the program, you will need to specify where the GLInject libraries are located with LD_LIBRARY_PATH when using OpenGL recording.

Other files you may want to read

notes.txt contains notes about the design of the program. It's a good idea read this first if you want to make changes to the code.

todo.txt contains a list of things that I still need to do. This file changes a lot of course.