Installing XPP Lab¶

XPP Lab comes ready to run on Windows, macOS and Linux, and as a Python package. Nothing else is needed: no X server, no compiler, no Terminal commands beyond the ones below.

Your computer	Download
Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit	XPPLab-Windows-x64.zip
macOS 11 or later, Apple silicon or Intel	XPPLab-macOS.dmg
Linux, x86-64	XPPLab-Linux-x86_64.tar.gz

These links always give the newest release. Every release, with its notes and checksums, is on the releases page.

The apps are not yet signed with a paid certificate (an Authenticode certificate on Windows, Apple's notarization on macOS). That is why Windows and macOS ask you to confirm the first time you open them. The steps below show how.

Windows¶

Download XPPLab-Windows-x64.zip and unzip it anywhere: your Documents, the Desktop or a USB stick. It needs no installation and no administrator rights.
Open the folder and run xpplab.exe.
If Windows shows "Windows protected your PC", click More info, then Run anyway. Windows asks only the first time.

The folder holds the app, the engine (libxppe.dll), SDL (SDL3.dll and libiconv-2.dll), XPPAUT's example models in examples, and the licences. To remove XPP Lab, delete the folder.

macOS¶

Download XPPLab-macOS.dmg and open it.
Drag the app to Applications.
Open it from Applications. The first time, macOS says it cannot check the app:
- macOS 15 and later: click Done, open System Settings > Privacy & Security, scroll down to the message about the app, click Open Anyway and confirm.
- macOS 14 and earlier: Control-click the app (or right-click it), choose Open, then Open again.

If macOS instead says the app "is damaged and can't be opened", the download's quarantine mark is to blame, not the app. Remove the mark in Terminal, then open the app as above:

xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/xpplab.app

The app runs natively on both Apple silicon and Intel Macs.

Linux¶

tar xzf XPPLab-Linux-x86_64.tar.gz
XPPLab-Linux-x86_64/xpplab

The folder holds the app, the engine (libxppe.so), SDL (libSDL3.so), the example models and the licences, and it runs from wherever you put it. It is built on Ubuntu 22.04 and needs a desktop with X11 or Wayland and OpenGL, which every desktop distribution has. If it does not start, run it from a terminal: the message says what is missing.

Python¶

The Python package runs the same engine, AUTO included, on Python 3.9 or later on all three systems. It is on PyPI, with a ready-built wheel for each system, so nothing is compiled on your machine:

pip install xpplab

For plots and data frames, add the extras: pip install "xpplab[all]". The wheels are also attached to each release. Then follow the Python quick start.

Checking a download¶

Each release lists the SHA-256 checksum of every file, in its notes and in the file SHA256SUMS. To compare, compute the checksum of your download:

System	Command
Windows (PowerShell)	`Get-FileHash XPPLab-Windows-x64.zip`
macOS	`shasum -a 256 XPPLab-macOS.dmg`
Linux	`sha256sum XPPLab-Linux-x86_64.tar.gz`

Building from source¶

To build XPP Lab yourself, or on a system without a download, see Building from source in the README. You need a C compiler, CMake 3.20 or later, and SDL 3 for the app.

Something went wrong?¶

Please open an issue with your system, the version (in Help > About XPP Lab), and what you saw.