Cannot build appimage -- Desktop file not found, aborting

[James-Hudson3010]

I have a sample project at https://github.com/jh3010-qt-questions/large_qrc which I am working with.

I have setup my directory structure according to the instructions:

$ tree usr/
usr/
├── bin
│   └── large_qrc
├── lib
└── share
    ├── applications
    │   └── large_qrc.desktop
    └── icons
        └── hicolor
            └── 256z256
                └── apps
                    └── large_qrc.png

My desktop files looks like:

$ cat usr/share/applications/large_qrc.desktop
[Desktop Entry]
Type=Application
Name=Large QRC
Comment=The best Qt Application Ever
Exec=large_qrc
Icon=large_qrc
Categories=Office;⏎

I then call linuxdeployqt:

$ linuxdeployqt usr/bin/large_qrc -appimage -qmake=/home/jamesh/Qt5.12.10/5.12.10/gcc_64/bin/qmake -qmldir=/home/jamesh/depot_qt/questions/large_qrc

linuxdeployqt 4 (commit 8b3ded6), build 571 built on 2018-10-07 20:58:12 UTC
FHS-like mode with PREFIX, fhsPrefix: "/home/jamesh/depot_qt/questions/appimage/usr"
app-binary: "/home/jamesh/depot_qt/questions/appimage/usr/bin/large_qrc"
appDirPath: "/home/jamesh/depot_qt/questions/appimage"
relativeBinPath: "usr/bin/large_qrc"
appimagetool, continuous build (commit d185526), build 1855 built on 2018-10-07 20:18:45 UTC
Desktop file not found, aborting

What am I doing wrong?

If it matters, I am using Ubuntu 20.04.

[probonopd]

Try

cd .. # You need to be outside of the AppDIr
linuxdeployqt appdir/usr/share/applications/large_qrc.desktop -appimage -qmake=/home/jamesh/Qt5.12.10/5.12.10/gcc_64/bin/qmake -qmldir=/home/jamesh/depot_qt/questions/large_qrc`

[James-Hudson3010]

that works. I did not realize that the tool, in this case, needed to point to the .desktop

[keshavbhatt]

I have similar problem creating appimage of one of my app,

 ./linuxdeployqt-continuous-x86_64.AppImage appdir/usr/bin/wonderwall -appimage -qmake="/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/bin/qmake"
linuxdeployqt 7 (commit 7d0bab4), build 730 built on 2021-04-27 18:47:56 UTC
FHS-like mode with PREFIX, fhsPrefix: "/tmp/appimage/appdir/usr"
app-binary: "/tmp/appimage/appdir/usr/bin/wonderwall"
appDirPath: "/tmp/appimage/appdir"
relativeBinPath: "usr/bin/wonderwall"
Keeping existing AppRun
WARNING: Plugin "/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/plugins/styles/libqgtk2style.so" not found, skipping
WARNING: "/tmp/appimage/appdir/usr/bin/qt.conf" already exists, will not overwrite.
appimagetool, continuous build (commit 8bbf694), build <local dev build> built on 2020-12-31 11:48:33 UTC
fatal: not a git repository (or any of the parent directories): .git
Failed to run 'git rev-parse --short HEAD: Child process exited with code 128 (code 128)
Desktop file not found, aborting

My desktop file is located in usr/share/applications/, output of tree :

$ tree appdir/usr/share/applications/
appdir/usr/share/applications/
└── wonderwall.desktop

0 directories, 1 file

Content of desktop file, output of cat :

$ cat appdir/usr/share/applications/wonderwall.desktop 
[Desktop Entry]
Version=1.0
GenericName=Wonderwall
Name=Wonderwall
Type=Application
Icon=wonderwall
Keywords=Wallpaper;Variety;wallch;desktop;background
Exec=wonderwall %F
Comment=Wallpaper manager for Linux
Categories=Utility;Settings;
Terminal=false
Name[en_IN]=Wonderwall

[keshavbhatt]

This is strange behaviour but I was able to build appimage with the following command using the .desktop file as argument instead of app binary:

$ ./linuxdeployqt-continuous-x86_64.AppImage appdir/usr/share/applications/wonderwall.desktop -appimage -qmake="/usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/bin/qmake" -no-copy-copyright-files

[probonopd]

Looks correct. But why -no-copy-copyright-files?

[keshavbhatt]

I don't know, since the option was there. Thought it will reduce size of AppImage.

[probonopd]

They are tiny text files and depending on what you are packaging they may be necessary for legal reasons.

[keshavbhatt]

Who unpacks an AppImage to see if one has shipped copyright files unless they are trying to sue someone. Kidding, I will remove that argument.