Download Quartus-lite-18.1.0.625-linux.tar from Intel

Make sure that you install the software at “/opt/altera/18.1”. Create the altera directory and change the owner to your username. Replace “fritz:fritz” with your username and group.

sudo mkdir /opt/altera
sudo chown fritz:fritz /opt/altera

When you run the installation, you can deselect all FPGA device families, except Cyclone V.

mkdir /tmp/qi
cd /tmp/qi
cp <TheQuartusTarFile> .
tar -xvf Quartus-lite-18.1.0.625-linux.tar
./setup.sh

In order to be able to start the binaries from the commandline, the path for the binaries has to be in the PATH environment variable. For that you have to modify the .profile file in your home directory. Append the following snippet to the .profile file:

.profile

# Include the ALTERA fpga software
PATH="$PATH:/opt/altera/18.1/quartus/bin"
# Include the ALTERA Modelsim VHDL simulator
PATH="$PATH:/opt/altera/18.1/modelsim_ase/bin"

To see the changes in the PATH variable, you have to logout and login again. After that you can already start modelsim and quartus (see below). To check the setting of the PATH variable do:

fritz@vcae:~$ echo $PATH
/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games:/opt/altera/18.1/quartus/bin:/opt/altera/18.1/modelsim_ase/bin
fritz@vcae:~$

You can see that the altera directories are now part of the PATH variable.

fritz@vcae:~$ quartus
quartus: error while loading shared libraries: libpng12.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory
fritz@vcae:~$ 

The following check shows that libpng16 is installed but quartus needs libpng12.

fritz@vcae:~$ dpkg -l | grep png
ii  libpng16-16:amd64                     1.6.34-1ubuntu0.18.04.1             amd64        PNG library - runtime (version 1.6)
fritz@vcae:~$

So download, compile and copy the libpng12 library to the quartus install directory

sudo apt install build-essential
wget https://www.hs-augsburg.de/homes/beckmanf/public/libpng-1.2.59.tar.gz
tar -xvzf libpng-1.2.59.tar.gz
cd libpng-1.2.59
./configure
make
cp .libs/libpng12.so* /opt/altera/18.1/quartus/linux64

When you try to run quartus and see this

fritz@vcae:/tmp$ quartus
/opt/altera/18.1/quartus/linux64/libstdc++.so.6: version `CXXABI_1.3.9' not found (required by /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libproxy.so.1)
Failed to load module: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/gio/modules/libgiolibproxy.so

(quartus:47747): Gtk-WARNING **: 18:17:46.016: Error loading theme icon 'dialog-warning' for stock: Unable to load image-loading module: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/gdk-pixbuf-2.0/2.10.0/loaders/libpixbufloader-svg.so: /opt/altera/18.1/quartus/linux64/libstdc++.so.6: version `CXXABI_1.3.8' not found (required by /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libicuuc.so.60)

then, you can do the following

cd /opt/altera/18.1/quartus/linux64
fritz@vcae:/opt/altera/18.1/quartus/linux64$ mv ./libstdc++.so.6 libstdc++.so.6.orig_dist
fritz@vcae:/opt/altera/18.1/quartus/linux64$ ln -s /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6 .

Run Quartus with

quartus 

and click the “Run the Quartus Prime software” button

When you run modelsim and see:

fritz@vcae:/tmp$ vsim
Error: cannot find "/opt/altera/18.1/modelsim_ase/bin/../linux_rh60/vsim"
fritz@vcae:/tmp$ 

then, you have to fix the vco script. First change the permissions such that you can modify the script.

cd /opt/altera/18.1/modelsim_ase
chmod u+w vco

Open the vco with

vi vco

and find the following section

      else
        case $utype in
          2.4.[7-9]*)       vco="linux" ;;
          2.4.[1-9][0-9]*)  vco="linux" ;;
          2.[5-9]*)         vco="linux" ;;
          2.[1-9][0-9]*)    vco="linux" ;;
          3.[0-9]*)             vco="linux" ;;
          *)                vco="linux_rh60" ;;

And change the “linux_rh60” entry to “linux”.

dir=`dirname "$arg0"`