propuke / electron-shared

A (proof of concept?) launcher for Electron apps that uses shared runtimes

Electron-shared

Usage
How to Build

A (proof of concept?) launcher for Electron apps
No need to include Electron with your apps, just use this? (or that's the theory)

1. Bundle your app in a app.asar package, or in a directory named app alongside this executable
2. Run it
3. Electron will be automatically downloaded if needed and your app will run

Electron-shared will look inside your package.json to check version requirements
If a version of electron meeting these hasn't already be downloaded it will do so (with an update dialog while it does so)
Runtimes get stored in AppData\Local\electron-shared, .cache/electron-shared and Library/Application Support/electron-shared
Future apps compatible with the same versions will make use of the same downloaded runtimes

Usage

Usage: ./electron-shared [options] [path]
       ./electron-shared [command]

  Download the latest supporting version of Electron for the specified PATH
  and then run the application using it.

  If omitted, path will default to "app"

  PATH must be a directory containing a project.json file or the path to an
  .asar archive (extension optional)

  Options:
    -d, --downloadOnly   Download any required Electron updates and then exit
    -n, --noDownload     Do NOT download if required Electron is not available
    -s, --silent         Do not display any user feedback while downloading

    Any other options will be passed directly to Electron (if it is executed)

  Commands:
    -h, --help           Display this help and exit
    -l, --list           Print the currently downloaded Electron versions
    -v, --version        Output version information and exit

Building

Building Electron-shared has only currently been tested from within Linux
It is cross-compiled for Windows from within Linux via MinGW
The makefiles should also work from within macOS, although this has not been tested
If anyone wants to contribute a native build process for Windows this would be greatly appreciated

First, clone the repo along with all submodules, by using the --recursive flag:

git clone --recursive https://github.com/ProPuke/electron-shared.git

Building is then done via 3 makefiles:

• makefile.posix - This will compile for your local (posix-compliant) OS. Libraries such as libcurl will be dynamically linked.
• makefile.mingw32 - This will compile for 32bit win32. Libraries such as libcurl will be statically compiled into the executable.
• makefile - This will simply call both of the above, producing both a native executable and a 32bit win32 executable for distribution

Building for Linux (and macOS)

To build exclusively for Linux (and hopefully also macOS), ensure cmake, the following libraries are installed: libcurl and libgtk-3-dev, and execute the posix makefile as follows:

make -f makefile.posix

This will generate a native electron-shared executable

Building for Windows (from within Linux)

To build for Windows from within Linux ensure cmake the following library is installed: mingw-w64, and execute the windows makefile as follows:

make -f makefile.mingw32

This will generate an electron-shared.exe 32bit executable

Building for Linux/macOS and Windows at once

To build for both targets at once, ensure you have the neccasary libaries for both, above, installed and simple execute the main makefile:

make

This will generate both a native electron-shared executable, and an electron-shared.exe 32bit win32 executable.

electron-shared's Issues

Windows executable seemingly does nothing.

I tried it in multiple terminals. In most of them, running electron-shared yields no output. On Git Bash, however, it yields a seg fault.

Version: v0.1-alpha.3, electron-shared-win32-ia32.exe

To reproduce:

• copy tests/electron-quick-start to a separate folder named "app"(or just rename it if you're lazy)
• Place electron-shared-win32-ia32.exe in the folder beside "app". Rename it to "electron-shared.exe" for convenience.
• Open git bash here, and type "./electron-shared". You'll get a seg fault.
• Open cygwin here, and type "./electron-shared". You'll get no output.
• Open cmd here, and type "electron-shared.exe". You'll get no output.
• Open powershell here, and type "./electron-shared.exe". You'll get no output.
• Double click the executable. Still nothing.

Add build instructions

Trying to build this on a fresh Ubuntu VM, but the VM is missing some libraries that this project depends on. Care to share a list of requirements in the readme, whenever you get around to it?

electron-shared fails when run through WSL Bash on Ubuntu

To reproduce:

• Open WSL Bash on Ubuntu on a Windows 10 machine
• Clone this repo and run "make" to build
• Copy or move the resulting "electron-shared" file to the "test" folder
• cd to the "test" folder and run "./electron-shared electron-quick-start"

You'll receive the following console output:

This application requires Electron ^4.0.7
Unable to init server: Could not connect: Connection refused
Unable to initialise libui
  Cannot open display:
Fetching release list from GitHub...
Downloading Electron 4.1.0...
Extracting...
Launching Electron 4.1.0 (^4.0.7)...
/home/ashelley/.cache/electron-shared/4.1.0/electron: error while loading shared libraries: libnss3.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory```

where's the resources directory?

process.resourcesPath points back to resources in the runtime directory. Apps can't specify files in there :S

This prob breaks auto-updaters and stuff.

What are we to do? Need to route it back to the app directory somehow.