Linux USB Blaster Installation

[Altera_Forum]

Anyone out there who can help me install a USB Blaster in the Linux environment?

[Altera_Forum]

Hi BeeGeeA 

 It is possible to install the USB Blaster for Linux, but you will need to change some permissions to allow users access to the USB ports (and their are some differences between distro's).  I have only done this on RHE3 and 4, but it's a similar story for SUSE etc. (I found some instructions in a NIOS II release)  Firstly you need to set up the permissions by adding and entry to the /etc/hotplug/usb.usermap. (before plugging in your USB-Blaster.)     #   # Altera USB-Blaster  #   usbblaster 0x03 0x09fb 0x6001 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0  usbblaster 0x03 0x09fb 0x6002 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0 0x0   Then add the following script as /etc/hotplug/usb/usbblaster    # !/bin/sh  # USB-Blaster hotplug script.  # Allow any user to access the cable  chmod 666 $DEVICE   This sets up your USB-Blaster permissions so that any user can access it.  Also do a 'chmod +x /etc/hotplug/usb/usbblaster' to make the script executable.  Now you will also need to and your users to a group with permissions to use the USB ports, or do a chmod -R 557 of /proc/bus/usb  Run a jtagconfig to confirm a happy installation   Enjoy :cool:

[Altera_Forum]

Thanks Mr. Penguin!

[Altera_Forum]

You have to make sure your linux kernel have usbfs first. If so easy solution. Otherwise you will have to follow a long thread. 

Since seeing your reply, I assume you sorted out the problem.

[Altera_Forum]

You may want to look at my post at 

 http://www.alteraforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=214   ...if your Linux distribution is using udev instead of devfs as the hotplugging system.   Best regards,     Ben

[Altera_Forum]

On AMD 64-bit OpenSuse 11.2 on a HP Pavillion laptop about 3 years old I had lots of problems getting USB Blaster to work. I did everything. Followed the instructions of all the Altera documents and added all the USB stuff under the /etc directory. Also played around with jtagd. Spent several hours for a few days I think carefully trying everything posted here. 

 I have USB blaster plugged into a Cyclone II evaluation board.  Anyway because I wanted to have the latest version of wine I decided to update OpenSuse to 11.4. After that reinstalled Quartus 11.0sp1 and told the programmer to use the USB-Blaster and clicked [START] and WOW!!!! It worked!!!!! I did nothing to this new OpenSuse 11.4 installation. I didn't change anything!!!!! except telling the programmer to use the USB-Blaster.  { 8/10/2011 A.D. Ohhh I just ran it again (editing this post). USB Blaster didn't work until I first ran quartus as root. Still didn't work. Then I created the ~root/.jtagd.conf (empty file). Then it worked. It's good to do > ps -ef | grep jtag to see the jtagd demon get created and it's parameters and see if it is deleted when quartus exits. It won't let me ps -9 (die sucker) it until I exit quartus. }  So if you're using an older openSuse try installing 11.4. Probably good to install it on a separate partition or USB drive if you sysem is already all setup and loaded with stuff you don't want to re-setup. OpenSuse 11.4 video driver was messing up the screen with lots of garbage. Solution for that was at GRUB boot menu there is a spot below where boot options can be added. I added "nomodeset" which causes it to use nv instead of nouveau. Is that the xserver name? Anyway it works fine with that. Can add the to /boot/grub/menu.lst  By the way first I tried to update OpenSuse from 11.2 to 11.4 which was supposed to work. I followed OpenSuse instructions carefully. After that rebooted and system had lots of problems. But I hadn't added much and I kept my own stuff under /home which is setup as a separate file system to I can reinstall without wiping /home. So don't trust updating OpenSuse.  I hope my USB Blaster keeps working! -Fred

[Altera_Forum]

I have written an updated instruction on this here: 

http://www.fpga-dev.com/altera-usb-blaster-with-ubuntu/  (Written for Ubuntu 14.04-64 with Quartus II 13.1.0 64-bit.)