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miyoungc merged 1 commit into from
Sep 23, 2025
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docs: add hardware reqs #1411

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18 changes: 13 additions & 5 deletions docs/getting-started/installation-guide.md
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# Installation Guide

This guide walks you through the following steps to install NeMo Guardrails:
This guide walks you through the following steps to install the NeMo Guardrails SDK:

1. Setting up a fresh virtual environment.
2. Installing using `pip`.
3. Installing from Source Code.
4. Optional dependencies.
5. Using Docker.

## Prerequisites
## Requirements

Review the following requirements to install the NeMo Guardrails SDK.

### Hardware Requirements

The NeMo Guardrails SDK runs on CPUs. This SDK adds a layer to manage processes between your application front-end and the backend LLM and does not require any GPUs.

### Software Requirements

- Python 3.9, 3.10, or 3.11

## Additional dependencies
### Additional Dependencies

NeMo Guardrails uses [annoy](https://github.com/spotify/annoy), which is a C++ library with Python bindings. To install it, you need to have a valid C++ runtime on your computer.
Most systems already have installed a C++ runtime. If the **annoy** installation fails due to a missing C++ runtime, you can install a C++ runtime as follows:

### Installing a C++ runtime on Linux, Mac, or Unix-based OS
#### Installing a C++ runtime on Linux, Mac, or Unix-based OS

1. Install `gcc` and `g++` using `apt-get install gcc g++`.
2. Update the following environment variables: `export CC=`*path_to_clang* and `export CXX=`*path_to_clang* (usually, *path_to_clang* is */usr/bin/clang*).
3. In some cases, you might also need to install the `python-dev` package using `apt-get install python-dev` (or `apt-get install python3-dev`). Check out this [thread](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/21530577/fatal-error-python-h-no-such-file-or-directory) if the error persists.

### Installing a C++ runtime on Windows
#### Installing a C++ runtime on Windows

Install the [Microsoft C++ Build Tools](https://visualstudio.microsoft.com/visual-cpp-build-tools/). This installs Microsoft Visual C++ (version 14.0 or greater is required by the latest version of **annoy**).

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