AppImage Specification README

For direct access to the current specification in writing please go to draft.md.

This repository holds the specification for the AppImage format. The objectives of this specification are to:

1. Be a single, definitive source of information about the AppImage format
2. Ensure AppImages behave in a consistent manner, thereby enabling third-party developers to write AppImage management applications and distributions to offer built-in support for AppImages
3. Serve as a guide for AppImageKit development
4. Provide developers with a checklist for creating AppImages
5. Enable a lintian-style application to be written to check AppImages for compliance with the standard (start here)
6. Indicate the direction of the project and warn developers of future changes to the AppImage format
7. Document the open nature of the AppImage format

AppImageKit is becoming a reference implementation of building standards-compliant AppImages, and the AppImages repository provides examples.

Contributing

• Proposals are discussed via GitHub Issues
• Pull request can be sent for final approval by the maintainer, currently @probonopd
• The specification is to be kept as concise as possible and will not include any kind of explanation, justification or help with implementation (although it may link to that information)
• The specification itself will only include the "what", and not the "why" or "how"
• Detailed justifications and explanation can be preserved by linking to the discussion in the actual pull request
• General help on creating AppImages is not part of this specification but can be found in the AppImageKit wiki

Organization of this repository