Installing on Linux¶
Status: experimental. The core Mastodon logic works on Linux, but two subsystems have limited support:
- Audio (
sound_lib) depends on the BASS audio library, which does not have an official Linux build. Sound effects will not play.- Screen reader integration uses a stub that logs speech to the Python logger instead of calling a real TTS engine. Spoken output requires additional setup (see below).
If you are a developer or an adventurous user, the following steps will get the application running without audio or native TTS.
Prerequisites¶
sudo apt install python3.12 python3.12-venv python3-wxgtk4.0
Or install Python via pyenv if your distribution ships an older version.
Install¶
python3.12 -m pip install --user pipx
python3.12 -m pipx ensurepath
pipx install lights-off --system-site-packages
The --system-site-packages flag is needed so that pipx's environment can see the
system-installed wxPython package, which is large and difficult to build from source.
Launch¶
lights-off
Expect no sound effects and no spoken output unless you wire up Speech Dispatcher manually (see Screen Readers — Linux).
Known issues on Linux¶
| Issue | Cause | Workaround |
|---|---|---|
| No sound effects | sound_lib not available |
None currently |
| No spoken output | No TTS backend | See Speech Dispatcher notes |
| wxPython build failures | C extensions need GTK dev headers | Use system wxPython package |