Installer hang when installing Matlab R2021b as root on Ubuntu 20.04

My operating system is Ubuntu 20.04 LTS. I must install Matalb as root, and always have done. This is historic as all specialist programs are installed in /opt.

I have now downloaded MATLAB R2021b and the Installer hang when installing Matlab R2021b as root on Ubuntu 20.04, the command sudo ./install just hangs with a blinking cursor, no Matlab install GUI is displayed.

As first attempted solution I have created a MATLAB/R2021b folder in /opt, that did not help.

I have also tried to install R2021b normally with defaults but although now I progress nicely to the Matlab GUI, but the default location /usr/local/MATLAB/R2021b cannot created/located and then I have to aboard.

I have always had to install MATLAB as root.

Any advice on getting the MATLAB install GUI to display on Ubuntu R2021b will be appreciated.

Thank you

[John Summerfield]

I’m having the exact same issue. Ubuntu 20.04 , Matlab R2021b installer hangs after running sudo ./install

[Lorson Blair]

I'm also having this issue. Ubuntu 20.04.

[Steph Bredenhann]

I have been advised by Matlab Support "This appears to be an issue with MATLAB R2021b under root not being able to access the X Server". Workaround is to run the following command

xhost +SI:localuser:root

[Lorson Blair]

./install works without the sudo, but you are unable to reach the Matlab folder I created /usr/local/MATLAB/R2021b. This is obvious since I did not use root access.

[Lorson Blair]

The solution suggested by Step works. Run the command and then run sudo ./install.

[Jonnathan Ortiz]

It worked for me! Cheers!!

[Greg Chance]

Was having issue with this too, solution worked.

[SEO Service]

It seems to be working for me now!

[Yantong Wang]

It also works on R2022a! Awesome!

[Nikolaos Frantzeskidis]

Can confirm works without issues with R2022a on Manjaro. Thank you very much!

[Vinícius de Andrade]

Resolveu meu problema muito obrigado!

[Axel Fragoso]

works on ubuntu 22.04 as well, thanks.

[Ozge]

I get this problem, installing R2022b But anthing solve my “product installer down” problem

[Henrik Grythe]

I worked my way around this problem, but got stopped at the next turn for R2022b.

[Henrik Grythe]

file looks like its there:

[Favia]

Hey guys! After I did the solution given by Step, I still get a message that says not found. Any solution for that?

Answer 1

[El'ad Gips]

this tip:

https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/1459909-installer-hang-when-installing-matlab-r2021b-as-root-on-ubuntu-20-04#comment_1759029

(run the command : xhost +SI:localuser:root)

and after

sudo ./install

worked for me (matlab 21b and ubuntu 20.04)

[Stephen Sangwine]

I tried this fix and it works. Ubuntu 20.04.2. R2021b.

[HUy Le]

It's worked

[omar elshazly]

it did not work for ubunto 18

[Vishesh Saini]

Thank you so much!

[Andrew Van Horn]

Tried this on Ubuntu 20.04 and it worked! This should be added to the install instructions. I wasted too much time trying to track down the problem.

[Cristina Lampón]

I had the same problem, tried this solution on Ubuntu 20.04 and it worked. Thank you!

[Johanphilip Davis]

I also had the same problem on Ubuntu 20.04. Currently, it is working. Thank you!

[Brenda Cyrielle Fochive Fewou]

It worked for me too thanks. But how do I get the short cut on the desktop please?

[Abhijeet Kishore]

Yes, it worked so smoothly. Thank you so much for your help.

[Michal]

Thanks for functional workaround! I spent a lot of time trying to solve this problem ... :(

[Olivier Alexander S Wartique]

Worked for me on Ubuntu 20.04 - Matlab R2021b

[Yusuf Oluwatoki Yusuf]

Worked for me too on Ubuntu 20.04 - Matlab R2021b

[ADITYA BHOPE]

Its of great help I tried to install but getting access issue

[Brian]

and what if i wish to install matlab on a system without a display/x server?

[Firat Soylu]

Thanks! This worked for me on Ubuntu 20.04 & Matlab 2021b after a fresh installation.

[창현 김]

Thanks.

[Kuan-Fu Wu]

Thanks. It worked for me on Ubuntu 20.04 with Matlab 2022a

[Wei Wang]

Thanks. It works for me on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS with Matlab R2022a

[Tiago]

Thank you! It works for me in Ubuntu 20.04.4 LTS and Matlab R2022a.

[Adnan]

For anyone wondering what's going on: Askubuntu xserver

Answer 2

[Atefeh Fazel Najafabadi]

worked for me on Ubuntu 18.04

Answer 3

[Daniel Brennan]

I encountered the same problem with the installer hanging and unresponsive on a gentoo variant linux OS. For me the problem was related to incompatibilities with the system installed libsqlite3.so.0 library.

I discovered the problem by manually running the <installer_dir>/bin/glnxa64/MATLABWindow in a terminal. Running MATLABWindow manually resulted in the following error message echoed in the terminal:

libsqlite3.so.0: Undefined Symbol: ubrk_open

This error is due to an incompatibility with the system libsqlite3.so.0 library support for icu (Internationalization Components for Unicode) and the Matlab installer. The matlab installer apparently requires dev-libs/icu v69 or later. My system has v67.

The solution is to force the installer to use Matlab's builtin libicu support. For a source based distro simply recompile sqllite without icu support. On a binary distro, you may be able to temproarily remove the executable bit (chmod -x) on the icu libs in your system library directory, install matlab, and then restore the executable bit back on the icu libs after installation.

[Daniel Brennan]

Running:

ldd <installer-dir>/bin/glnxa64/MATLABWindow

will identify what shared libraries are being used and help identify any problematic libraries.