Getting Set Up

How to build OpenHuman from source - toolchain, vendored Tauri CLI, and local desktop builds.

This guide covers the full desktop/source install path and release installers.

If you only need the repo-root Rust crate on a fresh machine, use Building the Rust Core. That page documents the pinned Rust toolchain, OS package prerequisites, and the exact cargo commands for openhuman-core.

This guide covers two paths:

1. Build and compile OpenHuman from source

2. Install the latest stable release binaries

Prerequisites

• git

• Node.js 24 or newer (see app/package.json)

• pnpm@10.10.0 (see the root package.json packageManager field)

• Rust 1.93.0 through rustup with rustfmt and clippy (see rust-toolchain.toml)

• CMake, required by native Rust dependencies

• Git submodules under app/src-tauri/vendor/, required for the vendored CEF-aware Tauri CLI

• Platform desktop build tools: Xcode Command Line Tools on macOS, or the Tauri GTK/WebKit/AppIndicator package set on Linux

macOS Homebrew quick start:

brew install node@24 pnpm rustup-init cmake
rustup toolchain install 1.93.0 --profile minimal
rustup component add rustfmt clippy --toolchain 1.93.0

Arch Linux quick start:

sudo pacman -S --needed nodejs npm rustup cmake base-devel clang openssl \
  alsa-lib xdotool libxtst libxi libevdev gtk3 webkit2gtk-4.1 \
  libayatana-appindicator librsvg patchelf nss nspr at-spi2-core \
  libcups libdrm libxkbcommon libxcomposite libxdamage libxfixes \
  libxrandr mesa pango cairo libxshmfence
npm install -g pnpm@10.10.0
rustup toolchain install 1.93.0 --profile minimal
rustup component add rustfmt clippy --toolchain 1.93.0

Build from source (local compile)

Run from the repository root:

# 1) Clone and enter the repo
git clone https://github.com/tinyhumansai/openhuman.git
cd openhuman

# 2) Fetch vendored Tauri/CEF sources
git submodule update --init --recursive

# 3) Install JS deps (workspace)
pnpm install

# 4) Build desktop app artifacts
pnpm build

For local development instead of production build:

# Web-only UI development
pnpm dev

# Desktop app development with the vendored Tauri/CEF CLI: run from the workspace root
pnpm --filter openhuman-app dev:app

Install latest stable release (macOS/Linux x64)

Primary install command:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tinyhumansai/openhuman/main/scripts/install.sh | bash

Installer behavior:

• Resolves latest stable OpenHuman release for your platform

• Validates artifact digest when available

• Installs locally (no sudo by default)

• macOS: installs OpenHuman.app into ~/Applications

• Linux x64: installs AppImage as ~/.local/bin/openhuman and writes a desktop entry

Arch Linux package recipe

The repository includes an openhuman-bin AUR recipe at packages/arch/openhuman-bin. It uses the official x86_64 AppImage as the binary source, extracts the bundled application tree during makepkg, installs a desktop entry, and exposes /usr/bin/openhuman.

Until the package is published on AUR, build it locally on Arch:

cd packages/arch/openhuman-bin
makepkg --syncdeps --install

After publication, Arch users can install it with:

yay -S openhuman-bin

Useful flags:

# Preview actions without writing files
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tinyhumansai/openhuman/main/scripts/install.sh | bash -s -- --dry-run

Windows (latest stable)

Use PowerShell:

irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tinyhumansai/openhuman/main/scripts/install.ps1 | iex

Windows installer behavior:

• Resolves latest stable release

• Downloads MSI/EXE for x64

• Verifies digest when available

• Runs per-user install where supported by installer package

ARM Linux Build (aarch64)

The ARM Linux build requires special handling due to CEF and GTK dependencies.

Prerequisites

# Install xvfb for headless builds/testing
sudo apt install xvfb

Build

cd app
pnpm tauri build --target aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu

Running the ARM binary

The binary requires the CEF library path to be set:

Option 1 - Direct invocation

REL_DIR=app/src-tauri/target/aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu/release
CEF_DIR=$(ls -d "$REL_DIR"/build/cef-dll-sys-*/out/cef_linux_aarch64 2>/dev/null | head -n1)
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH="$CEF_DIR:$REL_DIR/deps:$REL_DIR${LD_LIBRARY_PATH:+:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH}"
"$REL_DIR/OpenHuman" --no-sandbox

Option 2 - Wrapper script (recommended)

Save to ~/bin/openhuman and make it executable (chmod +x ~/bin/openhuman):

#!/bin/bash
REL_DIR=/path/to/app/src-tauri/target/aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu/release
CEF_DIR=$(ls -d "$REL_DIR"/build/cef-dll-sys-*/out/cef_linux_aarch64 2>/dev/null | head -n1)
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH="$CEF_DIR:$REL_DIR/deps:$REL_DIR${LD_LIBRARY_PATH:+:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH}"
exec "$REL_DIR/OpenHuman" --no-sandbox "$@"

DEB package install

DEB_FILE=$(ls app/src-tauri/target/aarch64-unknown-linux-gnu/release/bundle/deb/OpenHuman_*_arm64.deb | head -n1)
sudo dpkg -i "$DEB_FILE"

GTK initialization fix

The ARM build requires GTK to be initialized before Tauri creates the system tray. This is handled in vendor/tauri-cef/crates/tauri-runtime-cef/src/lib.rs:

// After CEF initialization, add:
#[cfg(target_os = "linux")]
{
    gtk::init().ok();
}

If the tray fails to initialize with "GTK has not been initialized", rebuild after ensuring this fix is in place.

Manual download links (all platforms):

• Website: https://tinyhuman.ai/openhuman

• Latest release: https://github.com/tinyhumansai/openhuman/releases/latest

Troubleshooting

macOS: pnpm dev:app exits with "CEF cache is held by another OpenHuman instance"

Symptom

pnpm dev:app (or any debug build of the Tauri shell) exits before the window appears with a message like:

[openhuman] CEF cache at /Users/<you>/Library/Caches/com.openhuman.app/cef is held by another OpenHuman instance (host <hostname>, pid 12345).
Quit the running instance and try again.
Workaround:
  pkill -f "OpenHuman.app/Contents"
  pkill -f "openhuman-core"

Cause

CEF (Chromium Embedded Framework) holds an exclusive lock on its user-data directory via a SingletonLock symlink under ~/Library/Caches/com.openhuman.app/cef. Both the installed .app bundle and the dev binary use the same identifier (com.openhuman.app), so they cannot run side-by-side. Without the preflight, cef::initialize returns failure and the vendored tauri-runtime-cef panics with a Rust backtrace and no actionable message (this was issue #864 before the preflight landed).

Fix

Quit the other OpenHuman instance and re-run. Fastest path:

pkill -f "OpenHuman.app/Contents"
pkill -f "openhuman-core"
pnpm dev:app

If the lock is left behind by a crashed process (PID no longer alive), the preflight removes the stale SingletonLock automatically and dev startup proceeds, no manual cleanup required.

Known limitation

Dev and release builds still share com.openhuman.app as the cache identifier. Isolating dev to a separate com.openhuman.app.dev cache requires changes to the vendored tauri-runtime-cef (cache path is built inside the runtime from the bundle identifier, not exposed to the openhuman shell). Tracked as a follow-up to #864.

Stale openhuman RPC process on the core port

Symptom

A previous Tauri build or openhuman-core run harness left a process listening on OPENHUMAN_CORE_PORT (default 7788). Until issue #1130 the new Tauri build would silently attach to that listener, leading to version drift and 401s when the new build's OPENHUMAN_CORE_TOKEN didn't match.

Current behavior (issue #1130)

core_process::ensure_running now probes the port at startup:

• If GET / identifies the listener as an OpenHuman core (JSON body with "name": "openhuman"), it is treated as a stale process from a previous run and proactively terminated (SIGTERM, then SIGKILL after 750ms on Unix; taskkill /F /T /PID on Windows). The Tauri host then spawns its own fresh embedded core.

• If the listener is something else (or doesn't speak HTTP), startup fails loudly with the conflict surfaced in the log instead of silently attaching.

• Set OPENHUMAN_CORE_REUSE_EXISTING=1 to opt back into the legacy attach-to-anything behavior, useful when running openhuman-core run as a manual debugging harness.

Manual cleanup (still works)

pkill -f "OpenHuman.app/Contents"
pkill -f "openhuman-core"