how to set up Kinect for your Linux Mint 12

This is a simple and short tutorial on how to set up Kinect for your Linux Mint 12 (It also should work fine with Ubuntu 12.04 or 12.10). For this task OpenNI Framework is going to be used. The official short description of OpenNI is : 


The OpenNI Framework provides the interface for physical devices and for middleware components. The API enables modules to be registered in the OpenNI framework and used to produce sensory data. Selecting the hardware or middleware module is easy and flexible.

This Tutorial will use the NITE middleware to enable skeleton tracking.

To install KInect with OpenNI and NITE please follow the next 5 steps, with your Kinect Unplugged.


Step 1 - Install Required support library

First step is to check if you have all the needed libraries, and if they are up to date.
sudo apt-get install libusb-1.0-0-dev freeglut3-dev g++

If you have a Nvidia graphics card it's recommended to have the latest drivers: Instruction here 

Step 2 - Create a folder for holding the download and the installation

I recommend to create a 'kinect'  in your home folder:
cd ~
mkdir kinect

Step 3 - Download the OpenNI , NITE

It's going to be necessary to download to the created folder the latest OpenNI  Binary and the NITE middleware. Until the publication of this tutorial the most recent version available were :

Update 06-JUN-2012*

If you are using Ubuntu 12.04 make sure to have the following versions (I tried Openni version 2.1.0, not working, but 1.5.4 works!):