How to build a plugin if sofa is installed using SOFA Binaries (SOFA_v24.06.00_Linux.run)

[thundermms]

I have been struggling to understand for a while on how to download new plugins and use them on sofa if sofa was installed using the prepackaged .run installer. Because in this case there is no src folder or build folder. Following this link , here it says for Linux (with SOFA binaries)
how to compile a plugin is "comming soon". and the video above on SOFA source won't work on my case as I do not have a src or build folder. Even the In-tree build and Out-tree build in this link talk about cmaking and adding them to the build of sofa but I don't have that.

I am not sure what I am missing here, I would really appreciate some handholding tutorial on this. ( I really appreciate the how to compile a plugin video for Linux (with SOFA source), a similar one for SOFA Binary would be veryy helpful!

I am using Linux 22.04
SOFA V24.06.00 installed through .run
want to install this RigidBodyDynamics plugin

[olivier-roussel]

Hi @thundermms ,
I you want to use SOFA and the RigidBodyDynamics plugin, I strongly recommend you to not install SOFA though the prepackaged binaries (.run or zip). The RigidBodyDynamics plugin requires some extra dependencies that might not mix well with pre-packaged ones in the SOFA binaries. The good practice would be to use full external dependencies for the RigidBodyDynamics plugin and SOFA, so either re-compile everything from source with all dependencies in one consistent place, either using a package of SOFA done with a package manager that will properly deal with the dependency resolution, such as conda (SOFA conda packages are available here.
The RigidBodyDynamics plugin is not officially released yet so a lot of features have not been implemented, but you can still try it out as it. I was working on providing easy instructions to install all its dependencies and to build it based on conda and pixi, it will be published on the plugin homepage. I'll update you when all the instructions you need to build the plugin (including installing SOFA and other dependencies) will be available. It should be done today.

[olivier-roussel]

I've updated installation instructions for the Sofa.RigidBodyDynamics plugin here. I suggest you to try this out and launch some examples as described to test everything is functional.
If you have troubles following these installation instructions, please open an issue on the plugin homepage directly.

[thundermms]

@olivier-roussel Thank you very much for your speedy reply on this ! I will try them out, and let you know if i face any other difficulties.
But I have been facing difficulty in installing other plugins aswell, due to the way I have installed sofa (.run) I understand for the RigidBodyDynamics package it is recommended to build sofa from scratch, but i would like to know if this is the case for all other plugins ( that doesn't come out of the box).

[olivier-roussel]

To clarify, for RigidBodyDynamics, it is recommended to either use the conda packages if you want to use SOFA binaries (so not the .zip or .run files), either recompile everything from source.
May be the other plugins you want to install are also available as conda packages, could you list the other plugins you want to install ?

[thundermms]

I am writing here for continuity purposes.

I understand from @olivier-roussel that RigidBodyDynamics plugin can only be used if SOFA is built from scratch, but i want to know how to install other plugins. If sofa is installed using .run, i am not sure how to install/build a plugin. The in-tree build and Out-tree build are both pointing instructions for SOFA built from scratch and not for binaries.

[hugtalbot]

Hi ,
Indeed @thundermms the next release v25.06 will include the RigidBodyDynamics plugin. To build SOFA and plugins, please refer to the documentation: https://sofa-framework.github.io/doc/plugins/build-a-plugin-from-sources/
If SOFA is installed using .run --> means out-of-tree