Installing Big Blue Button (BBB) On Ubuntu

Big Blue Button (BBB) is a free, open source video conferencing solution that can be installed on Ubuntu machines and accessed via web browser. This software provides a free alternative to similar services such as Zoom and Google Meet. In this guide, we will outline how to install Big Blue Button on your Ubuntu machine.

Topics Include: 

• Installing Big Blue Button
• Configuring Browser Access

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Installing Big Blue Button

1. First, you will want to check the locale of your system using the following command: 
   
   

   cat /etc/default/locale

   
   
2. In order for Big Blue Button to function properly, it must be set to en_US.ETF-8. If it is not set to that already, you can change the locale via the following command:
   
   

   apt install -y language-pack-en && update-locale LANG=en_US.UTF-8

   
   
3. If you are using a virtual server such as a VPS, you will need to add entropy, or randomness, to the server in order for Big Blue Button to function. To do this, we will install the haveged random number generator utility using the following command:
   
   

   apt install -y haveged

   
   
4. Next, you will need to add the multiverse repository to your repository (repo) list using the following command: 
   
   

   echo "deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ xenial multiverse" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list

   
   
5. Then add the BBB repo using the following command:
   
   

   wget http://ubuntu.bigbluebutton.org/repo/bigbluebutton.asc -O- | sudo apt-key add -

   
   
6. Next, you will need to designate the URL of the packages being used for the installation using the following command: 
   
   

   echo "deb http://ubuntu.bigbluebutton.org/xenial-110/ bigbluebutton-xenial main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/bigbluebutton.list

   
   
7. Now, you can install BBB using the following command:
   
   

   apt install bigbluebutton

   
   
   Once the installation has finished, restart BBB with the following command:
   
   

   bbb-conf --restart

Configuring Browser Access

1. To set up browser access, you will first need to install the BBB API demos using the following command: 
   
   

   apt install -y bbb-demo

   
   
2. To access the login page, visit your hostname prefaced by “bbb-”, for example: 
   
   

   bbb-hostname.com

Congratulations, you have successfully installed Big Blue Button!