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Host Application Installation

doc/install_host.rst

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.. _installing_host:

Host Application Installation #############################

The Looking Glass Host application captures frames from the guest OS using a capture API, and sends them to the :ref:client <client_install>—be it on the host OS (hypervisor) or another Virtual Machine—through a low-latency transfer protocol over shared memory.

You can get the host program in two ways:

  • Download a pre-built binary from https://looking-glass.io/downloads (Recommended)

  • Download the source code as described in :ref:building, then :ref:build the host <host_building>.

.. _host_install_linux:

For Linux ^^^^^^^^^

While the host application can be compiled and is somewhat functional for Linux it is currently considered incomplete and not ready for usage. As such use at your own risk and do not ask for support.

.. _host_install_osx:

For OSX ^^^^^^^

Currently there is no support or plans for support for OSX due to technical limitations.

.. _host_install_windows:

For Windows ^^^^^^^^^^^

To begin, you must first run the Windows VM with the changes noted in the :doc:install_libvirt section.

.. _installing_the_ivshmem_driver:

Installing the IVSHMEM driver


Since B6 the host installer available on the official Looking Glass website
comes with the IVSHMEM driver and will install this for you. If you are running
an older version of Looking Glass please refer to the documentation for your
version.

.. _host_install_service:

Installing the Looking Glass service

After installing your IVSHMEM driver, we can now install the Looking Glass Host onto our Windows Virtual Machine.

  1. First, run looking-glass-host-setup.exe as an administrator (:ref:Why? <faq_host_admin_privs>)
  2. You will be greeted by an intro screen. Press Next to continue.
  3. You are presented with the |license| license. Please read and agree to the license by pressing Agree.
  4. You can change the install path if you wish, otherwise press Next to continue.
  5. You may enable or disable options on this screen to configure the installation. The default values are recommended for most users. Press Install to begin installation.
  6. After a few moments, installation will complete, and you will have a running instance of Looking Glass. If you experience failures, you can see them in the install log appearing in the middle of the window.
  7. Press Close to exit the installer.

Command line users can run looking-glass-host-setup.exe /S to execute a silent install with default options selected. Further configuration from the command line can be done with flags. You can list all available flags by running looking-glass-host-setup.exe /?.