Installing Red on Linux or Mac

Warning

For safety reasons, DO NOT install Red with a root user. If you are unsure how to create a new user on Linux, see this guide by DigitalOcean.

Installing the pre-requirements

Please install the pre-requirements using the commands listed for your operating system.

The pre-requirements are:
  • Python 3.8.1 or greater
  • Pip 18.1 or greater
  • Git 2.11+
  • Java Runtime Environment 11 (for audio support)

We also recommend installing some basic compiler tools, in case our dependencies don’t provide pre-built “wheels” for your architecture.

Operating systems


Arch Linux

sudo pacman -Syu python python-pip git jre11-openjdk-headless base-devel

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.


CentOS and RHEL 7

sudo yum -y groupinstall development
sudo yum -y install zlib-devel bzip2 bzip2-devel readline-devel sqlite sqlite-devel \
  openssl-devel xz xz-devel tk-devel libffi-devel findutils java-11-openjdk-headless
sudo yum -y install centos-release-scl
sudo yum -y install devtoolset-8-gcc devtoolset-8-gcc-c++
echo "source scl_source enable devtoolset-8" >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

In order to install Git 2.11 or greater, we recommend adding the IUS repository:

sudo yum -y install https://repo.ius.io/ius-release-el7.rpm
sudo yum -y swap git git224

Complete the rest of the installation by installing Python 3.8 with pyenv.


CentOS and RHEL 8

sudo yum -y install epel-release
sudo yum -y update
sudo yum -y groupinstall development
sudo yum -y install git zlib-devel bzip2 bzip2-devel readline-devel sqlite sqlite-devel \
  openssl-devel xz xz-devel tk-devel libffi-devel findutils java-11-openjdk-headless

Complete the rest of the installation by installing Python 3.8 with pyenv.


Debian Stretch

Note

This guide is only for Debian Stretch users, these instructions won’t work with Raspbian Stretch. Raspbian Buster is the only version of Raspbian supported by Red.

We recommend installing pyenv as a method of installing non-native versions of python on Debian Stretch. This guide will tell you how. First, run the following commands:

sudo echo "deb http://deb.debian.org/debian stretch-backports main" >> /etc/apt/sources.list.d/red-sources.list
sudo apt update
sudo apt -y install make build-essential libssl-dev zlib1g-dev libbz2-dev libreadline-dev \
  libsqlite3-dev wget curl llvm libncurses5-dev xz-utils tk-dev libxml2-dev libxmlsec1-dev \
  libffi-dev liblzma-dev libgdbm-dev uuid-dev python3-openssl git openjdk-11-jre-headless
CXX=/usr/bin/g++

Complete the rest of the installation by installing Python 3.8 with pyenv.


Debian and Raspbian Buster

We recommend installing pyenv as a method of installing non-native versions of python on Debian/Raspbian Buster. This guide will tell you how. First, run the following commands:

sudo apt update
sudo apt -y install make build-essential libssl-dev zlib1g-dev libbz2-dev libreadline-dev \
  libsqlite3-dev wget curl llvm libncurses5-dev xz-utils tk-dev libxml2-dev libxmlsec1-dev \
  libffi-dev liblzma-dev libgdbm-dev uuid-dev python3-openssl git openjdk-11-jre-headless
CXX=/usr/bin/g++

Complete the rest of the installation by installing Python 3.8 with pyenv.


Fedora Linux

Fedora Linux 30 and above has all required packages available in official repositories. Install them with dnf:

sudo dnf -y install python38 git java-11-openjdk-headless @development-tools

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.


Mac

Install Brew: in Finder or Spotlight, search for and open Terminal. In the terminal, paste the following, then press Enter:

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/master/install.sh)"

After the installation, install the required packages by pasting the commands and pressing enter, one-by-one:

brew install python@3.8
echo 'export PATH="/usr/local/opt/python@3.8/bin:$PATH"' >> ~/.profile
source ~/.profile
brew install git
brew cask install adoptopenjdk/openjdk/adoptopenjdk11

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.


openSUSE

openSUSE Leap

We recommend installing a community package to get Python 3.8 on openSUSE Leap. This package will be installed to the /opt directory.

First, add the Opt-Python community repository:

source /etc/os-release
sudo zypper -n ar -f \
  https://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/Rotkraut:/Opt-Python/openSUSE_Leap_${VERSION_ID}/ \
  Opt-Python
sudo zypper -n --gpg-auto-import-keys ref

Now install the pre-requirements with zypper:

sudo zypper -n install opt-python38 opt-python38-setuptools git-core java-11-openjdk-headless
sudo zypper -n install -t pattern devel_basis

Since Python is now installed to /opt/python, we should add it to PATH. You can add a file in /etc/profile.d/ to do this:

echo 'export PATH="/opt/python/bin:$PATH"' | sudo tee /etc/profile.d/opt-python.sh
source /etc/profile.d/opt-python.sh

Now, install pip with easy_install:

sudo /opt/python/bin/easy_install-3.8 pip

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.

openSUSE Tumbleweed

openSUSE Tumbleweed has all required dependencies available in official repositories. Install them with zypper:

sudo zypper -n install python3-base python3-pip git-core java-11-openjdk-headless
sudo zypper -n install -t pattern devel_basis

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.


Ubuntu 16.04 LTS

We recommend adding the openjdk-r ppa to install Java 11:

sudo apt update
sudo apt -y install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository -yu ppa:openjdk-r/ppa

We recommend adding the git-core ppa to install Git 2.11 or greater:

sudo add-apt-repository -yu ppa:git-core/ppa

We recommend adding the deadsnakes ppa to install Python 3.8.1 or greater:

sudo add-apt-repository -yu ppa:deadsnakes/ppa

Now install the pre-requirements with apt:

sudo apt -y install python3.8 python3.8-dev python3.8-venv python3-pip git openjdk-11-jre-headless \
  build-essential

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.


Ubuntu 18.04 LTS

We recommend adding the git-core ppa to install Git 2.11 or greater:

sudo apt update
sudo apt -y install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:git-core/ppa

We recommend adding the deadsnakes ppa to install Python 3.8.1 or greater:

sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:deadsnakes/ppa

Now install the pre-requirements with apt:

sudo apt -y install python3.8 python3.8-dev python3.8-venv python3-pip git openjdk-11-jre-headless \
  build-essential

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.


Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

We recommend adding the git-core ppa to install Git 2.11 or greater:

sudo apt update
sudo apt -y install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository -y ppa:git-core/ppa

Now install the pre-requirements with apt:

sudo apt -y install python3.8 python3.8-dev python3.8-venv python3-pip git openjdk-11-jre-headless \
  build-essential

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.


Ubuntu non-LTS versions

We recommend adding the git-core ppa to install Git 2.11 or greater:

sudo apt update
sudo apt -y install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository -yu ppa:git-core/ppa

Now, to install non-native version of python on non-LTS versions of Ubuntu, we recommend installing pyenv. To do this, first run the following commands:

sudo apt -y install make build-essential libssl-dev zlib1g-dev libbz2-dev libreadline-dev \
  libsqlite3-dev wget curl llvm libncurses5-dev xz-utils tk-dev libxml2-dev \
  libxmlsec1-dev libffi-dev liblzma-dev libgdbm-dev uuid-dev python3-openssl git openjdk-11-jre-headless
CXX=/usr/bin/g++

And then complete the rest of the installation by installing Python 3.8 with pyenv.


Installing Python with pyenv

Note

If you followed one of the sections above, and weren’t linked here afterwards, you should skip this section.

On distributions where Python 3.8 needs to be compiled from source, we recommend the use of pyenv. This simplifies the compilation process and has the added bonus of simplifying setting up Red in a virtual environment.

command -v pyenv && pyenv update || curl https://pyenv.run | bash

After this command, you may see a warning about ‘pyenv’ not being in the load path. Follow the instructions given to fix that, then close and reopen your shell.

Then run the following command:

CONFIGURE_OPTS=--enable-optimizations pyenv install 3.8.3 -v

This may take a long time to complete, depending on your hardware. For some machines (such as Raspberry Pis and micro-tier VPSes), it may take over an hour; in this case, you may wish to remove the CONFIGURE_OPTS=--enable-optimizations part from the front of the command, which will drastically reduce the install time. However, be aware that this will make Python run about 10% slower.

After that is finished, run:

pyenv global 3.8.3

Pyenv is now installed and your system should be configured to run Python 3.8.

Continue by Creating a Virtual Environment.

Creating a Virtual Environment

Tip

If you want to learn more about virtual environments, see page: About Virtual Environments

We require installing Red into a virtual environment. Don’t be scared, it’s very straightforward.

You have 2 options:


Using venv

This is the quickest way to get your virtual environment up and running, as venv is shipped with python.

First, choose a directory where you would like to create your virtual environment. It’s a good idea to keep it in a location which is easy to type out the path to. From now, we’ll call it redenv and it will be located in your home directory.

Create your virtual environment with the following command:

python3.8 -m venv ~/redenv

And activate it with the following command:

source ~/redenv/bin/activate

Important

You must activate the virtual environment with the above command every time you open a new shell to run, install or update Red.

Continue by Installing Red.


Using pyenv virtualenv

Using pyenv virtualenv saves you the headache of remembering where you installed your virtual environments. This option is only available if you installed Python with pyenv.

First, ensure your pyenv interpreter is set to python 3.8.1 or greater with the following command:

pyenv version

Now, create a virtual environment with the following command:

pyenv virtualenv <name>

Replace <name> with whatever you like. If you ever forget what you named it, you can always use the command pyenv versions to list all virtual environments.

Now activate your virtualenv with the following command:

pyenv shell <name>

Important

You must activate the virtual environment with the above command every time you open a new shell to run, install or update Red. You can check out other commands like pyenv local and pyenv global if you wish to keep the virtualenv activated all the time.

Continue by Installing Red.

Installing Red

Choose one of the following commands to install Red.

To install without additional config backend support:

python -m pip install -U pip setuptools wheel
python -m pip install -U Red-DiscordBot

Or, to install with PostgreSQL support:

python -m pip install -U pip setuptools wheel
python -m pip install -U Red-DiscordBot[postgres]

Note

These commands are also used for updating Red

Setting Up and Running Red

After installation, set up your instance with the following command:

redbot-setup

This will set the location where data will be stored, as well as your storage backend and the name of the instance (which will be used for running the bot).

Once done setting up the instance, run the following command to run Red:

redbot <your instance name>

It will walk through the initial setup, asking for your token and a prefix. You can find out how to obtain a token with this guide, section “Creating a Bot Account”.

Tip

If it’s the first time you’re using Red, you should check our Getting started guide that will walk you through all essential information on how to interact with Red.