Please allow desktop app to be built without requiring electron downloads.

[eli-schwartz]

When running yarn run package --platform linux --appVersion=${tagname#v} to build the desktop app (this seems to be handled in https://github.com/keybase/client/blob/master/shared/desktop/package.js) this really only has one option and that is to download prebuilt electron packages and build everything into some vendored binary distribution in shared/desktop/release/linux-x64/Keybase-linux-x64/

The only thing that is really needed is shared/desktop/release/linux-x64/Keybase-linux-x64/resources/app/, and from a distro packaging perspective it is far superior to e.g. package this as /usr/lib/keybase/ and use a launcher script that runs electron /usr/lib/keybase/ via a system electron installation.

I would appreciate if there was some (documented) method to simply generate the app directory without requiring all that extra work, and thereby simplifying the process of distro packaging for Keybase.

[eli-schwartz]

https://www.archlinux.org/packages/?q=keybase

Arch Linux now (after keybase/kbfs#1487) ships a keybase package containing the main binary and messaging host, and a kbfs package containing the kbfsfuse and git-remote-keybase utilities for KBFS integration. I'd like to add the electron GUI as well, if possible.

[eli-schwartz]

So I've been looking into this (with some help from @tensor5).

And it looks like the app -- usually created in shared/desktop/release/linux-x64/Keybase-linux-x64/resources/app/ -- is first generated in shared/desktop/build/, and, critically, that is created before electron gets messed with at all.

By using this patch: https://github.com/eli-schwartz/client/commit/dd702aa897b36ee758b21d369c3fb66e967b411d I can trick yarn install && yarn run package into creating the app, but quitting before it tries to mess with electron.

@oconnor663, would it be possible to make this easier to do without patching the source, e.g. provide a dedicated target to build the app without automatically trying to import or execute electron-packager or shared/desktop/yarn-helper/electron.js? (Perhaps it could be an optional dependency? I'm not sure what the current split is between devDependencies and regular dependencies.)

[oconnor663]

I will be on the road tomorrow, but I will take a look at this on this bus :)

[eli-schwartz]

Also I don't know why https://github.com/keybase/client/blob/6e95ab068a0144cf9f9eaad843d9cb322493702d/shared/desktop/package.desktop.js#L120 copies these files over here, as they're not used by the production electron app and aside from this copy action, the build/ folder is a 1-to-1 match for the final app that is run by electron, or, alternatively, stored in the electron-packager generated package's "resources" folder.

What I'd currently do, I guess, is copy the whole thing then delete that one folder, which is sort of what electron-packager does with its ignore keyword.

[eli-schwartz]

@oconnor663 since we don't package the redirector or anything and the run_keybase script seems to do... kind of a lot... I'm probably just going to provide a wrapper script which exec electron /usr/share/keybase-app/

Is there anything you'd really consider important for it to do, other than that?

[eli-schwartz]

I've now uploaded https://www.archlinux.org/packages/community/x86_64/keybase-gui/ using my experimental patch. Arch Linux users can now install the entire keybase stack, minus the run_keybase script (which I've expressed my opinion on before).

The keybase-gui script I packaged instead is here: https://git.archlinux.org/svntogit/community.git/tree/trunk/keybase-gui?h=packages/keybase