First, you need to download ONOS to your computer:

$ wget https://downloads.onosproject.org/release/onos-1.10.2.zip

You may also download other versions from https://wiki.onosproject.org/display/ONOS/Downloads.

Extract the ZIP into the /opt directory:

$ unzip https://downloads.onosproject.org/release/onos-1.10.2.zip

Rename the extracted folder to onos and go to the onos/bin directory:

$ mv onos-1.10.2 onos
$ cd onos/bin

Now, start ONOS:

./onos-service start
            __ __                  ____      
           / //_/____ __________ _/ __/      
          / ,<  / __ `/ ___/ __ `/ /_        
         / /| |/ /_/ / /  / /_/ / __/        
        /_/ |_|\__,_/_/   \__,_/_/         
    
  Apache Karaf (3.0.3)
    
Hit '<tab>' for a list of available commands
and '[cmd] --help' for help on a specific command.
Hit '<ctrl-d>' or type 'system:shutdown' or 'logout' to shutdown Karaf.
karaf@root()> 

Despite the misleading name, please note that this just starts ONOS Apache Karaf console. It does not start ONOS as a Linux service.

Now your ONOS controller is ready in your laptop. You may test it by running a Mininet emulation to connect to ONOS:

$ sudo mn --controller=remote,ip=127.0.0.1 --topo tree,depth=3,fanout=2 
[sudo] password for pradeeban: 
*** Creating network
*** Adding controller
Connecting to remote controller at 127.0.0.1:6653
*** Adding hosts and stations:
h1 h2 h3 h4 h5 h6 h7 h8 
*** Adding switches and access point(s):
s1 s2 s3 s4 s5 s6 s7 
*** Adding link(s):
(s1, s2) (s1, s5) (s2, s3) (s2, s4) (s3, h1) (s3, h2) (s4, h3) (s4, h4) (s5, s6) (s5, s7) (s6, h5) (s6, h6) (s7, h7) (s7, h8) 
*** Configuring hosts
*** Starting controller(s)
c0 
*** Starting switches and/or access points
s1 s2 s3 s4 s5 s6 s7 ...
*** Starting CLI:
mininet-wifi> 

This creates a network of tree topology with ONOS as the SDN controller. The following screenshot shows ONOS and Mininet execution: