This page explains how to install Freeplane for the Ubuntu operating system, there are 3 main ways to proceed.

First: check Java is installed

Make sure Java is installed:

  • Choose Applications > Ubuntu Software center
  • Type in the search field: Java
  • In the list that opens, choose JDK Java 6 Runtime
  • If you see "Remove", Java is already installed. If you see "Install", click it to install Java.

Option 1 : install from the official Ubuntu software repository

  1. Freeplane is packaged for Debian/Ubuntu, you just need to run: apt-get install freeplane

If the Freeplane package for your distro is out of date, see option 2 or option 3 below (it requires download from SourceForge official Freeplane project hosting).

Option 2 : install with .deb file

For every Freeplane release, starting with 1.6.5, there is a .deb available which includes all libraries, so it works on Debian/Ubuntu.

  • download the generic .deb: go to http://sourceforge.net/projects/freeplane/, click "Browse all files", navigate to "freeplane stable"

  • download freeplane_+upstream-1_all.deb

  • install it using dpkg -i *.deb

  • this will create a menu entry for Freeplane, mime type mappings etc

  • you're done ;-).

Option 3 : install with the binary package

  1. Download Freeplane binary package
  • For newest version goto http://www.freeplane.org/preview/ and download Freeplane_bin-XXXX.zip, in which XXXX is a shown version number.
  • Or for the official version goto http://sourceforge.net/projects/freeplane/ and press download.
  • Then choose Open with Archive manager, and press OK

  1. Extract the freeplane directory
  • In the download window press extract, select the location (e.g. Documents) and press Extract again.
  • Then open the the directory where you extracted freeplane (Documents) and open the newly created Freeplane directory.

  1. Then run freeplane
  • In the extracted directory, double-click on Freeplane.sh and select Run (or run in terminal window). Now Freeplane opens and you can use it.

**If you want you can customize the installation as follows.**
  1. For easy access, add Freeplane to Applications > Office:
  • Right-click Apllications and select Edit Menus
  • Select Office (left) and select Add Menu item (right)
  • Type a name, e.g. freeplane
  • Browse to the directory with freeplane, click freeplane.sh and press ok
  • With freeplane selecte, press Properties
  • Click on the icon on the left and browse via Documenten > FreeplaneXXX to the file freeplane.svg; and select it. Now freeplane is added to Office with the freeplane icon.

  1. For faster access, add the freeplane icon to the toolbar:
  • Goto Applications > Office and right-click Freeplane.
  • Select add this launcher to toolbar.

  1. Now you can start freeplane by pressing its icon in the toolbar