How to install CouchPotato on Linux

Do you download a lot of media files off the internet through Usenet and torrents? Wish you could automate the process? If so, you need the Couch Potato application. It’s an interesting tool that, once configured correctly, can automatically download various torrent and Usenet files from many different sources! In this post, we’ll go over how you install CouchPotato on Linux.

Use a VPN with CouchPotato

Using CouchPotato allows you to automatically get the latest torrents and Usenet downloads over the internet. While it’s not against the law, getting files over Usenet and Torrent on a home internet connection is a risk, as many ISPs dislike it when their customers use their internet connection in this way.

If you choose to use the Couch Potato application on Linux to get media files via Usenet and Torrent, we highly recommend using a VPN to stay safe and secure.

ExpressVPN takes the top spot as the best VPN reviewed by our security experts. It works well on Linux and has an excellent client for download. Better still, they offer fast download speeds with 256-bit AES encryption and perfect forward secrecy across 94 different countries. Also, they have an exclusive offer for AddictiveTips readers: 3 months free on the annual plan, a 49% discount.

Install CouchPotato

If you go to the Couch Potato website, you won’t find a “Linux” download page or even explicit instructions about all of the Linux operating systems that the project supports. Instead, you’ll see a Microsoft Windows Logo, an Apple macOS logo, and a GitHub logo, with a link to the project’s source code.

While it’s annoying that the project doesn’t have any convenient binaries available for download on various popular Linux distributions, it’s understandable, as many notable Linux OS projects wouldn’t be comfortable with hosting the files. So, if you plan to use CouchPotato on Linux, the only option is to build everything from the source code.

The first step in getting the CouchPotato application working on Linux via source code involves installing a few packages. These packages are build dependencies, and without them, the source code will not compile correctly.

To get the dependencies working, launch a terminal window and follow the command-line instructions that correspond to the Linux distribution you use.

Ubuntu

sudo apt install git python2

sudo pip install --upgrade pyopenssl

Debian

sudo apt-get install git python

sudo pip install --upgrade pyopenssl

Arch Linux

sudo pacman -S git python2

sudo pip install --upgrade pyopenssl

Fedora

sudo dnf install git python2

sudo pip install --upgrade pyopenssl

OpenSUSE

sudo zypper install git python

sudo pip install --upgrade pyopenssl

Generic Linux

CouchPotato doesn’t require that much in the way of dependencies to get working on Linux. According to the website, the only real tools you’ll need to get the software running is the Git tool for pulling down the code, and Python 2.7 or higher.

Both Git and Python 2.7 are readily available on virtually any Linux distribution out there. If you’d like to get it working on your Linux system but are unsure about where to look, check Pkgs.org.

Download source code

The source code for the CouchPotato application is hosted on Github. Getting the code down from the repository is extremely easy. To do it, launch a terminal window and use the git clone command.

git clone https://github.com/CouchPotato/CouchPotatoServer.git couchpotato

With the code downloaded to your Linux system, use the mv command and move the code from the home directory (~/) into the /opt/ folder in the Root file-system.

sudo mv couchpotato /opt/

Once the code is inside the /opt/ directory on your Linux system, it’s possible to start the Couch Potato server with the following commands.

cd /opt

./CouchPotato.py

As it starts up, CouchPotato should instantly load up in a new browser tab. If you want to stop the server, at any time go to the terminal window that is currently running the software and press Ctrl + C.

Uninstall CouchPotato

Need to uninstall CouchPotato from your Linux system? Here’s what to do. First, launch a terminal window. Then, elevate the terminal session to Root with the su or sudo -s command.

su -

sudo -s

Move the terminal window to the /opt folder where CouchPotato’s code is.

cd /opt/

Delete the code folder using the rm command.

rm -rf couchpotato

With the folder gone, CouchPotato is uninstalled from your Linux system!

Using CouchPotato

When the app is up and running in the browser window, you’ll see a configuration wizard. Use the wizard and use it to configure your settings for CouchPotato.