diff --git a/docs/Chipyard-Basics/Initial-Repo-Setup.rst b/docs/Chipyard-Basics/Initial-Repo-Setup.rst
index 1ab06c7a..931da013 100644
--- a/docs/Chipyard-Basics/Initial-Repo-Setup.rst
+++ b/docs/Chipyard-Basics/Initial-Repo-Setup.rst
@@ -10,6 +10,19 @@ Chipyard is developed and tested on Linux-based systems.
 
 .. Warning:: Working under Windows is not recommended.
 
+
+In CentOS-based platforms, we recommend installing the following dependencies:
+
+.. include:: /../scripts/centos-req.sh
+   :code: bash
+
+In Ubuntu/Debian-based platforms (Ubuntu), we recommend installing the following dependencies:
+
+.. include:: /../scripts/ubuntu-req.sh
+   :code: bash
+
+.. Note:: When running on an Amazon Web Services EC2 FPGA-development instance (for FireSim), FireSim includes a machine setup script that will install all of the aforementioned dependencies (and some additional ones).
+
 Checking out the sources
 ------------------------
 
diff --git a/scripts/centos-req.sh b/scripts/centos-req.sh
new file mode 100755
index 00000000..8fac61af
--- /dev/null
+++ b/scripts/centos-req.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,18 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+
+sudo yum groupinstall -y "Development tools"
+sudo yum install -y gmp-devel mpfr-devel libmpc-devel zlib-devel vim git java java-devel
+curl https://bintray.com/sbt/rpm/rpm | sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/bintray-sbt-rpm.repo
+sudo yum install -y sbt texinfo gengetopt
+sudo yum install -y expat-devel libusb1-devel ncurses-devel cmake "perl(ExtUtils::MakeMaker)"
+# deps for poky
+sudo yum install -y python36 patch diffstat texi2html texinfo subversion chrpath git wget
+# deps for qemu
+sudo yum install -y gtk3-devel
+# deps for firemarshal
+sudo yum install -y python36-pip python36-devel rsync libguestfs-tools makeinfo expat ctags
+# Install GNU make 4.x (needed to cross-compile glibc 2.28+)
+sudo yum install -y centos-release-scl
+sudo yum install -y devtoolset-8-make
+# install DTC
+sudo yum install -y dtc
diff --git a/scripts/ubuntu-req.sh b/scripts/ubuntu-req.sh
new file mode 100755
index 00000000..1858c3a4
--- /dev/null
+++ b/scripts/ubuntu-req.sh
@@ -0,0 +1,19 @@
+#!/bin/bash
+
+sudo apt-get install -y build-essential bison flex
+sudo apt-get install -y libgmp-dev libmpfr-dev libmpc-dev zlib1g-dev vim git default-jdk default-jre
+# install sbt: https://www.scala-sbt.org/release/docs/Installing-sbt-on-Linux.html
+echo "deb https://dl.bintray.com/sbt/debian /" | sudo tee -a /etc/apt/sources.list.d/sbt.list
+curl -sL "https://keyserver.ubuntu.com/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0x2EE0EA64E40A89B84B2DF73499E82A75642AC823" | sudo apt-key add
+sudo apt-get update
+sudo apt-get install -y sbt
+sudo apt-get install -y texinfo gengetopt
+sudo apt-get install -y libxpat1-dev libusb-dev libncurses5-dev cmake
+# deps for poky
+sudo apt-get install -y python3.6 patch diffstat texi2html texinfo subversion chrpath git wget
+# deps for qemu
+sudo apt-get install -y libgtk-3-dev
+# deps for firemarshal
+sudo apt-get install -y python3-pip python3.6-dev rsync libguestfs-tools expat ctags
+# install DTC
+sudo apt-get install -y device-tree-compiler