Why do some MATLAB features fail on Ubuntu 23.04 and Debian 12 with exit code 127 in MATLAB R2022b and MATLAB R2023a?

In Ubuntu 23.04 and Debian 12 there is an incompatibility between MATLAB and some third-party libraries that are shipped with MATLAB. As a result, some MATLAB/Simulink features do not work. Affected features include, but are not limited to:

• App Designer
• UIFigure
• Add-On Explorer and Add-On Manager
• Simulink start page
• Simulink Data Inspector
• Signal Analyzer
• Curve Fitter

When started, these features fail with the following error:

 

Error using matlab.internal.cef.webwindow

   MATLABWindow application failed to launch. Unable to launch the MATLABWindow application. The exit code was: 127


   Error in matlab.internal.webwindow/createImplementation (line 319)

                   implObj = matlab.internal.cef.webwindow(varargin{:});


   Error in matlab.internal.webwindow (line 163)

               obj.impl = obj.createImplementation(varargin{:});

How can I resolve this issue?

Answer 1

[MathWorks Support Team]

This is a known issue for MATLAB R2022b and MATLAB R2023a on Ubuntu 23.04 and Debian 12.

Please note these platforms do not fulfill the System Requirements for these releases, as shown at the link below. To ensure you receive the best product experience, it is recommended to use MATLAB on one of the qualified platforms listed on these pages.

• MATLAB R2023a: https://www.mathworks.com/support/requirements/matlab-linux.html
• MATLAB R2022b: https://www.mathworks.com/content/dam/mathworks/mathworks-dot-com/support/sysreq/files/system-requirements-release-2022b-linux.pdf

One of the following workarounds may also help avoid this issue:

• Run MATLAB on Ubuntu 23.04 or Debian 12 while using the system version of the affected library, instead of the version included with MATLAB, by using the "LD_PRELOAD" environment variable. For example, in a bash shell, start MATLAB with the command:

$ env LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libfreetype.so.6 matlab

OR

• Remove the specific library from the MATLAB installation directory:

$ sudo mv <matlabroot>/bin/glnxa64/libfreetype.so.6 <matlabroot>/bin/glnxa64/libfreetype.so.6.bak 

Note that, in the above, "<matlabroot>" needs to be replaced with the full path to the directory where MATLAB was installed. For additional details about finding the location where MATLAB is installed, please refer to the following documentation page:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/ref/matlabroot.html

Answer 2

[Mikhail]

I wonder why MathWorks ships system libraries with MATLAB? Is there a reason to do this?

If the reason is because some other library bundled with MATLAB is built against these specific library versions shipped with MATLAB and won't work with system libraries, then this suggested workaround will simply break something else (and it will).

MATLAB still requires a bunch of other system libraries and they don't ship them.

So why not stop bundling system libraries with MATLAB at all and instead provide a definitive list of required dependencies (instead of having me to pull them from matlab-deps docker image for ubuntu or installing matlab-support pseudo package on debian)?