electron-installer-flatpak

electron-installer-flatpak

Create a flatpak for your Electron app. This is based off the electron-installer-debian tool.

Requirements

This tool requires flatpak >= 0.6.13 to be installed on your system.

Installation

For use from command-line:

$ npm install -g electron-installer-flatpak

For use in npm scripts or programmatically:

$ npm install --save-dev electron-installer-flatpak

Usage

Say your Electron app lives in path/to/app, and has a structure like this:

.
├── LICENSE
├── README.md
├── node_modules
│   ├── electron-packager
│   └── electron-prebuilt
├── package.json
├── resources
│   ├── Icon.png
│   ├── IconTemplate.png
│   └── [e-mail]
└── src
    ├── index.js
    ├── main
    │   └── index.js
    └── renderer
        ├── index.html
        └── index.js

You now run electron-packager to build the app for flatpak:

$ electron-packager . app --platform linux --arch x64 --out dist/

And you end up with something like this in your dist folder:

.
└── dist
    └── app-linux-x64
        ├── LICENSE
        ├── LICENSES.chromium.html
        ├── content_shell.pak
        ├── app
        ├── icudtl.dat
        ├── libgcrypt.so.11
        ├── libnode.so
        ├── locales
        ├── natives_blob.bin
        ├── resources
        ├── snapshot_blob.bin
        └── version

How do you turn that into a flatpak package that your users can install?

Command-Line

If you want to run electron-installer-flatpak straight from the command-line, install the package globally:

$ npm install -g electron-installer-flatpak

And point it to your built app:

$ electron-installer-flatpak --src dist/app-linux-x64/ --dest dist/installers/ --arch x86_64

You'll end up with the package at dist/installers/app_0.0.1_x86_64.flatpak.

Scripts

If you want to run electron-installer-flatpak through npm, install the package locally:

$ npm install --save-dev electron-installer-flatpak

Edit the scripts section of your package.json:

{
  "name": "app",
  "description": "An awesome app!",
  "version": "0.0.1",
  "scripts": {
    "start": "electron .",
    "build": "electron-packager . app --platform linux --arch x86_64 --out dist/",
    "flatpak64": "electron-installer-flatpak --src dist/app-linux-x64/ --dest dist/installers/ --arch x86_64"
  },
  "devDependencies": {
    "electron-installer-flatpak": "*",
    "electron-packager": "*",
    "electron-prebuilt": "*"
  }
}

And run the script:

$ npm run flatpak64

You'll end up with the package at dist/installers/app_0.0.1_x86_64.flatpak.

Programmatically

Install the package locally:

$ npm install --save-dev electron-installer-flatpak

And write something like this:

var installer = require('electron-installer-flatpak')

var options = {
  src: 'dist/app-linux-x64/',
  dest: 'dist/installers/',
  arch: 'amd64'
}

console.log('Creating package (this may take a while)')

installer(options, function (err) {
  if (err) {
    console.error(err, err.stack)
    process.exit(1)
  }

  console.log('Successfully created package at ' + options.dest)
})

You'll end up with the package at dist/installers/app_0.0.1_x86_64.flatpak.

Options

Even though you can pass most of these options through the command-line interface, it may be easier to create a configuration file:

{
  "dest": "dist/installers/",
  "icon": "resources/Icon.png",
  "categories": [
    "Utility"
  ]
}

And pass that instead with the config option:

$ electron-installer-flatpak --src dist/app-linux-x64/ --arch x86_64 --config config.json

Anyways, here's the full list of options:

src

Type: String Default: undefined

Path to the folder that contains your built Electron application.

dest

Type: String Default: undefined

Path to the folder that will contain your flatpak installer.

rename

Type: Function Default: function (dest, src) { return path.join(dest, src); }

Function that renames all files generated by the task just before putting them in your dest folder.

options.id

Type: String Default: io.atom.electron

App id of the flatpak, used in the id field of a flatpak-builder manifest.

options.productName

Type: String Default: package.productName || package.name

Name of the application (e.g. Atom), used in the Name field of the desktop specification.

options.genericName

Type: String Default: package.genericName || package.productName || package.name

Generic name of the application (e.g. Text Editor), used in the GenericName field of the desktop specification.

options.description

Type: String Default: package.description

Short description of the application, used in the Comment field of the desktop specification.

options.branch

Type: String Default: master

Release branch of the flatpak, used in the branch field of a flatpak-builder manifest.

options.base

Type: String Default: io.atom.electron.BaseApp

Base app to use when building the flatpak, used in the base field of a flatpak-builder manifest.

options.baseVersion

Type: String Default: master

Base app version, used in the base-version field of a flatpak-builder manifest.

options.baseFlatpakref

Type: String Default: FIXME

Url of a flatpakref to use to auto install the base application.

options.runtime

Type: String Default: org.freedesktop.Platform

Runtime id, used in the runtime field of a flatpak-builder manifest.

options.runtimeVersion

Type: String Default: 1.4

Runtime version, used in the runtime-version field of a flatpak-builder manifest.

options.sdk

Type: String Default: org.freedesktop.Sdk

Sdk id, used in the sdk field of a flatpak-builder manifest.

options.arch

Type: String Default: undefined

Machine architecture the package is targeted to.

options.finishArgs

Type: Array[String] Default:

[
  // X Rendering
  '--socket=x11', '--share=ipc',
  // Open GL
  '--device=dri',
  // Audio output
  '--socket=pulseaudio',
  // Read/write home directory access
  '--filesystem=home',
  // Chromium uses a socket in tmp for its singleton check
  '--filesystem=/tmp',
  // Allow communication with network
  '--share=network',
  // System notifications with libnotify
  '--talk-name=org.freedesktop.Notifications'
],

Arguments to use when call flatpak build-finish, use in the finish-args field of a flatpak-builder manifest.

Changing this can be used to customize permissions of the sandbox the flatpak will run in.

options.bin

Type: String Default: package.name

Relative path to the executable that will act as binary for the application, used in the Exec field of the desktop specification.

The generated package will contain a symlink /usr/bin/<%= options.name %> pointing to the path provided here.

For example, providing this configuration:

{
  src: '...',
  dest: '...',
  name: 'foo',
  bin: 'resources/cli/launcher.sh'
}

Will create a package with the following symlink:

usr/bin/foo@ -> ../lib/foo/resources/cli/launcher.sh

And a desktop specification with the following Exec key:

Exec=foo %U

options.icon

Type: String or Object[String:String] Default: undefined

Path to a single image that will act as icon for the application:

{
  icon: 'resources/Icon.png'
}

Or multiple images with their corresponding resolutions:

{
  icon: {
    '48x48': 'resources/Icon48.png',
    '64x64': 'resources/Icon64.png',
    '128x128': 'resources/Icon128.png',
    '256x256': 'resources/Icon256.png'
  }
}

options.categories

Type: Array[String] Default: []

Categories in which the application should be shown in a menu, used in the Categories field of the desktop specification.

For possible values check out the Desktop Menu Specification.

options.mimeType

Type: Array[String] Default: []

MIME types the application is able to open, used in the MimeType field of the desktop specification.

Meta

• Code: git clone git://github.com/endlessm/electron-installer-flatpak.git
• Home: https://github.com/endlessm/electron-installer-flatpak/

Contributors

• Daniel Perez Alvarez ([e-mail])
• Matt Watson ([e-mail])

License

Copyright (c) 2016 Daniel Perez Alvarez (unindented.org). This is free software, and may be redistributed under the terms specified in the LICENSE file.