OpenCV not working properly with python on Linux with anaconda. Getting error that cv2.imshow() is not implemented

Question

This is the exact error that I am getting. My OS is Ubuntu 16.10.

OpenCV Error: Unspecified error (The function is not implemented. Rebuild the library with

Answer 1

If you installed OpenCV using the opencv-python pip package at any point in time, be aware of the following note, taken from https://pypi.python.org/pypi/opencv-python

IMPORTANT NOTE MacOS and Linux wheels have currently some limitations:

• video related functionality is not supported (not compiled with FFmpeg)
• for example cv2.imshow() will not work (not compiled with GTK+ 2.x or Carbon support)

Also note that to install from another source, first you must remove the opencv-python package

Answer 2

I followed this tutorial (OpenCV GTK+2.x error) and did the following. It worked for me :

1. install the packages : libgtk2.0-dev and pkg-config
2. cd to your opencv directory
3. mkdir Release
4. cd Release
5. Run the command : cmake -D CMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=RELEASE -D CMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/usr/local -D WITH_TBB=ON -D BUILD_NEW_PYTHON_SUPPORT=ON -D WITH_V4L=ON -D INSTALL_C_EXAMPLES=ON -D INSTALL_PYTHON_EXAMPLES=ON -D BUILD_EXAMPLES=ON -D WITH_QT=ON -D WITH_GTK=ON -D WITH_OPENGL=ON ..
6. make
7. sudo make install

Answer 3

My Envirment is Win10, and I added the anaconda path to the environment variables's PATH’,the cv2.imshow worked

C:\Users\user\Anaconda3
C:\Users\user\Anaconda3\Scripts

Then restart the windows

Answer 4

Although this is already answered, for me conda-forge solution worked with a hack. My workstation is a centos 6 machine, and I use conda virtual environment (anaconda 2). Create an environment

conda create --name test python=2.7

and then activate it

conda activate test

Now install opencv from conda-forge

conda install -c conda-forge opencv

Now install matplotlib in this environment (and this is hack 1)

conda install matplotlib

Let's check now imshow works or not. In a terminal, activate test environment and start python. In the interpreter, do

import cv2
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt # hack 2
img = cv2.imread('your_image_file',0)
cv2.imshow('image',img)

This should pop up a window showing image. I did not further research how this solved the case.

Note 1: You may see some error related to xkb, then in your .bashrc file add

export QT_XKB_CONFIG_ROOT=/usr/share/X11/xkb

Note 2: You may see some error related to XDG_RUNTIME_DIR, then in your .bashrc file also add

export XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=.tmp/myruntime and define myruntime by mkdir -p .tmp/myruntime

Answer 5

Notice that it is complaining for libgtk2.0-dev and pkg-config. Here is the solution. Uninstall your existing openCV installation.

conda remove opencv3

Install these packages before installing opencv- conda install gtk2 pkg-config

Now install opencv from menpo conda install -c https://conda.anaconda.org/menpo opencv3

Answer 6

I have had to deal with this issue a couple of times, this is what has worked consistently thus far:

conda remove opencv
conda install -c menpo opencv
pip install --upgrade pip
pip install opencv-contrib-python