This is an example project demonstrating how to use LVGL on a GNU/Linux systems and other Unix-like operating systems

LVGL provides drivers for many graphics backends. Legacy framebuffer (fbdev), modern DRM/KMS, Wayland, X11, GLFW3 and SDL2.

Check out this blog post for a step by step tutorial for fbdev https://blog.lvgl.io/2018-01-03/linux_fb

Clone the project

git clone https://github.com/lvgl/lv_port_linux.git
cd lv_port_linux/

LVGL is a submodule of lv_port_linux, use the following command to fetch it, it will be downloaded to the lvgl/ directory

git submodule update --init --recursive

Adjust lv_conf.defaults to select the drivers and libraries that will be compiled by modifying the following definitions, setting them to 1 or 0

You can also start with a default config based on the drivers you want to use, you can find a default config for each graphic driver inside the configs folder.

You can either replace lv_conf.defaults manually or using CMake

cmake -B build -DCONFIG=<config_name> 

With <config_name> the name of the config without the .defaults extension, eg: configs/wayland.defaults becomes wayland.

Be sure to install the required dependencies for the selected drivers by checking the documentation for each driver here: https://docs.lvgl.io/master/details/integration/driver/

You can also check the Dockerfiles to get the names of the packages for various distributions

LVGL supports GNU make and CMake

cmake -B build
cmake --build build -j$(nproc)

Cross compilation is supported with CMake, edit the user_cross_compile_setup.cmake to set the location of the compiler toolchain and build using the commands below

cmake -B build -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=./user_cross_compile_setup.cmake 
cmake --build build -j$(nproc)

It is possible to install LVGL to your system using cmake:

cmake --install ./build

./build/bin/lvglsim

This will start the widgets demo

If multiple backends are enabled you can run with a specific backend via the -b option

./build/bin/lvglsim -b sdl

To get a list of supported backends use the -B option

Environment variables can be set to modify the behavior of the driver(s) Check the documentation of the drivers for more details

• LV_LINUX_FBDEV_DEVICE - override default (/dev/fb0) framebuffer device node.

• LV_LINUX_EVDEV_POINTER_DEVICE - the path of the input device, i.e. /dev/input/by-id/my-mouse-or-touchscreen. If not set, devices will be discovered and added automatically.

• LV_LINUX_DRM_CARD - override default (/dev/dri/card0) card.

• LV_SIM_WINDOW_WIDTH - width of the window (default 800).
• LV_SIM_WINDOW_HEIGHT - height of the window (default 480).

By default, unpriviledged users don't have access to the framebuffer device /dev/fb0. In such cases, you can either run the application with sudo privileges or you can grant access to the video group.

sudo adduser $USER video
newgrp video
./build/bin/lvglsim