Hm, that sounds a bit vague.
And isn't software on Linux supposed to know what it needs to run and install needed dependencies?
Instead of a proprietary installer, integration in the established Linux pipelines would probably make more sense there?
I'll check out those dependencies, I think I saw a list somewhere.
Cheers,
Tom
Houdini with Linux and Wayland
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- ThomasHelzle
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- alexmajewski
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No, that's just how Linux is. You have a bunch of libraries floating around that are shared by programs and you need to make sure they're there. Usually there aren't that many, but Houdini has a broad range of abilities and uses a lot of them. There are different workarounds for it like Flatpak or even Nix that behave as you described, but you're not going to be able to use those now.
The list is available here [www.sidefx.com]
But as you can see, Arch-based distros aren't officially supported. That only means you need to figure things out yourself, don't worry. Houdini will work on CachyOS.
Here are our Arch equivalents that I used and they seem to work:
If you install these, I believe Houdini should boot up and let you click things. Lastly, installing X11 is simple and you can switch between Wayland and X11 on the login screen at any moment. Installing X11 usually requires just a couple of packages, something like this for Plasma:
(Warning: I've never actually used Plasma, I don't know if the above will work for you. I use i3wm and all I need to install is "i3 xorg-server" to make it happen)
The list is available here [www.sidefx.com]
But as you can see, Arch-based distros aren't officially supported. That only means you need to figure things out yourself, don't worry. Houdini will work on CachyOS.
Here are our Arch equivalents that I used and they seem to work:
sudo pacman -S alsa-lib cups dbus expat fontconfig glib2 glibc curl libdrm gcc-libs libglvnd libice libsm util-linux libx11 libxcb libxcomposite libxdamage libxext libxfixes libxi libxkbcommon libxkbcommon-x11 libxkbfile libxrandr libxrender libxshmfence libxt libxfst glu ncurses nspr nss xorg-server-xvfb pciutils xcb-util-cursor xcb-util-image xcb-util-keysyms xcb-util-renderutil xcb-util-wm
If you install these, I believe Houdini should boot up and let you click things. Lastly, installing X11 is simple and you can switch between Wayland and X11 on the login screen at any moment. Installing X11 usually requires just a couple of packages, something like this for Plasma:
sudo pacman -S plasma-workspace xorg-server
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- ThomasHelzle
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All the libraries seem to be installed already, so that shouldn't be it.
xorg also was installed already.
I still see the splashscreen for a while before I get the segmentation fault.
Crash report from bd32249f; Houdini FX Version 21.0.694 [linux-x86_64-gcc11.2] Uptime 3 seconds Sun Apr 26 10:52:55 2026 Caught signal 11 Traceback from 24918 ThreadId=0x7f77dcd5d400 AP_Interface::coreDumpChaser(UTsignalHandlerArg) <libHoudiniUI.so> AP_Interface::si_CrashHandler::chaser(UTsignalHandlerArg) <libHoudiniUI.so> signalCallback(UTsignalHandlerArg) <libHoudiniUT.so> UT_Signal::UT_ComboSignalHandler::operator()(int, siginfo_t*, void*) const <libHoudiniUT.so> UT_Signal::processSignal(int, siginfo_t*, void*) <libHoudiniUT.so> __sigaction <libc.so.6> [0x546bf] <libGLX_nvidia.so.0> _nv019glcore <libnvidia-glcore.so.595.58.03> _nv009glcore <libnvidia-glcore.so.595.58.03> clGetExtensionFunctionAddress <libnvidia-opencl.so.1> clGetGLContextInfoKHR <libOpenCL.so.1> CE_Context::getContext(bool, bool) [clone .localalias] <libHoudiniUT.so> RE_Visual::createSharedGLWidget_() <libHoudiniUI.so> RE_Visual::RE_Visual(RE_DisplayMode) <libHoudiniUI.so> RE_OGLRender::getVisualForMode(RE_DisplayMode) <libHoudiniUI.so> UI_QtWindow::doOpen() <libHoudiniUI.so> UI_Queue::processNextEvent() <libHoudiniUI.so> UI_Queue::drain() <libHoudiniUI.so> UI_Queue::drainEvents(bool, bool) <libHoudiniUI.so> OPUI_MainApp::onUiCreated(UI_Event*) <libHoudiniAPPS2.so> UI_Queue::processNextEvent() <libHoudiniUI.so> UI_Queue::drain() <libHoudiniUI.so> UI_Queue::eventLoop() <libHoudiniUI.so> main <libHoudiniUI.so> __libc_init_first <libc.so.6> __libc_start_main <libc.so.6> std::__throw_bad_array_new_length() <houdini-bin>
Does that tell anybody anything?
This is still using wayland.
Cheers,
Tom
Edited by ThomasHelzle - 2026年4月26日 04:59:58
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- alexmajewski
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When you go to your system login screen, can you switch to X11? Bottom left from the screenshots that I'm seeing online. There should be a dropdown with a list of Wayland and X11. First I'd make sure Houdini starts up on X11. If it does, the error is likely related to Wayland.
As for your error, I don't actually know, but I'm seeing OpenCL and OpenGL in there and those two have been a problem for me multiple times with Houdini. It's possible you might be missing some nvidia packages or environment variables.
As for your error, I don't actually know, but I'm seeing OpenCL and OpenGL in there and those two have been a problem for me multiple times with Houdini. It's possible you might be missing some nvidia packages or environment variables.
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- ThomasHelzle
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Thanks alex - I solved it now:
I'm using a laptop with AMD onboard and RTX 3070 dedicated GPU.
-> The installer seems not to set Houdini to use the dedicated GPU.
I had problems changing this before, so I investigated, found out how to set it up and now Houdini starts.
I'll have to see how stable it is (still using wayland).
Thanks for bearing with me and all the pointers! 🙏🙏🙏
Cheers,
Tom
I'm using a laptop with AMD onboard and RTX 3070 dedicated GPU.
-> The installer seems not to set Houdini to use the dedicated GPU.
I had problems changing this before, so I investigated, found out how to set it up and now Houdini starts.
I'll have to see how stable it is (still using wayland).
Thanks for bearing with me and all the pointers! 🙏🙏🙏
Cheers,
Tom
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- alexmajewski
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I'm glad you were able to sort it out 
Last tip just in case you missed it: remember there are two types of Houdini, regular one and qt5 build. I don't know where we're standing at right now, but in the past qt5 was the version that worked better with Wayland. And Houdini 20.5.X QT6 was working extremely well. Qt5 version (and 20.5 QT6) is available right next to the regular one. QT6 uses PySide6 and QT5 uses PySide2 which will be important for your addons.
Last tip just in case you missed it: remember there are two types of Houdini, regular one and qt5 build. I don't know where we're standing at right now, but in the past qt5 was the version that worked better with Wayland. And Houdini 20.5.X QT6 was working extremely well. Qt5 version (and 20.5 QT6) is available right next to the regular one. QT6 uses PySide6 and QT5 uses PySide2 which will be important for your addons.
Edited by alexmajewski - 2026年4月26日 06:43:47
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- ThomasHelzle
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- tommygdawg
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ThomasHelzle
Hey,
from this discussion I take it, that the latest Houdini 21 should run on CachyOS with KD Plasma, right?
I installed it with no problems, but get a segmentation fault crash when I try to start it.
Anything else I need to install to get it to work?
I'm pretty new to CachyOS (2+ days), trying to find out if I can finally move to Linux after decades on Windows... :-)
Cheers,
Tom
Don't give up! Or if you do, that's okay too LOL. I will say it took me a good while to start to really feel comfortable with Linux (CachyOS being my first distro). Trying to figure out Linux while trying to figure out the complexities of getting Houdini working properly can be a lot.
I'm wondering if it might be a drivers issue? Did you install the gaming packages? What GPU are you running? I'm running a 5090, I installed the gaming packages, and didn't have any issues launching Houdini out of the box.
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- tommygdawg
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ThomasHelzle
Thanks alex, I'll check that out.
ATM the interface is brutally slow, when I click something it takes 10-20 seconds until it reacts.
Will report if I find a solution.
Cheers,
Tom
Ah, I see you figured it out. My bad! This particular issue might be due to driver versions. I had this too, and downgrading to 580 drivers fixed it. There's a Reddit post I learned from that tells you how. I can't share links here, but you just need to do the following:
downgrade command in terminal:
sudo pacman -S lib32-nvidia-580xx-utils lib32-opencl-nvidia-580xx libxnvctrl-580xx nvidia-580xx-open-dkms nvidia-580xx-settings nvidia-580xx-utils opencl-nvidia-580xxrevert back to current:
sudo pacman -S linux-cachyos-nvidia-open linux-cachyos-lts-nvidia-open nvidia-utils opencl-nvidia lib32-nvidia-utils lib32-opencl-nvidia nvidia-settings
Edited by tommygdawg - 昨日 15:50:41
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- ThomasHelzle
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Thanks a ton tommy,
I didn't investigate further since there is so much else to learn about CachyOS.
So far I always used debian or fedora based distros (started 1996 with Suse on a server actually ;-) ) but somehow never liked them too much. Cachy so far feels much better and I have a good basic system with all important tools set up now, that I use as my daily system to get used to it and learn.
Will probably keep Windows around though, since my main version is Houdini 16.5 Core, which I bought ages ago and which still does all I really need for my generative work - and I don't expect that to run on a current distro :-)
Will test the driver.
And yes, I have the game package installed, since that was recommended somewhere else (not a gamer here).
It's an Asus ROG STRIX laptop with a Radeon on board GPU and a RTX 3070.
Thanks for everybodies help!
Cheers,
Tom
I didn't investigate further since there is so much else to learn about CachyOS.
So far I always used debian or fedora based distros (started 1996 with Suse on a server actually ;-) ) but somehow never liked them too much. Cachy so far feels much better and I have a good basic system with all important tools set up now, that I use as my daily system to get used to it and learn.
Will probably keep Windows around though, since my main version is Houdini 16.5 Core, which I bought ages ago and which still does all I really need for my generative work - and I don't expect that to run on a current distro :-)
Will test the driver.
And yes, I have the game package installed, since that was recommended somewhere else (not a gamer here).
It's an Asus ROG STRIX laptop with a Radeon on board GPU and a RTX 3070.
Thanks for everybodies help!
Cheers,
Tom
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