I think that an optimal solution (and a pretty fit for me) would be for
the linuxdeployqt to just deploy all the necessary files next to the
specified binary.
It's up to a developer what to do next with all the files.
Of course, linuxdeployqt can also support (optionally) any number of
various packages. But this should be optional and has a less priority to
implement.
On 8/9/2022 4:50 PM, Roland Hughes via Interest wrote:
On 8/9/22 05:00, Vadim Peretokin wrote:
Just to correct some biases here, in my opinion as a software publisher
AppImage is still the simplest way for a user to run your app.?
To get Mudlet (a FOSS text games client) all you need to do is go to
https://www.mudlet.org/download, download the .tar, right-click to
extract it and double-click to run.?
Not to discount your experience, but I've been in IT almost 40 years
now. Not once in my career have I ever used an AppImage. I have used
Debian, RPM, Snap, and Flatpak.
Most companies and many Linux distros have started making it more
difficult for someone to "just download and install from a Web site"
because Malware is everywhere.
When your OpenSource project includes the scripts to make a proper
Debian or RPM package, you dramatically increase the odds of getting
your package into the actual distro repos. Does any distro actually
put AppImage files in their repo? I'm asking. I have never heard of it
but that doesn't mean there isn't some obscure distro doing that.
Ubuntu will eventually abandon Snap just like they did UpStart.
https://www.phoronix.com/news/MTYwNDE
Ubuntu has a history of bad ideas, Unity not even being the worst.
In fact, Ubuntu has already started their migration away from Snap by
installing Flatpak out of the box in Ubuntu Mate 22.04
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2022/02/ubuntu-mate-22-04-flatpak-support
Why? Because the Linux distros that matter, some of them YABUs
themselves have all integrated Flatpak.
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2022/02/ubuntu-mate-22-04-flatpak-support
You have to understand where it is going to understand why. Arch based
distros tried to solve this problem in their own way years ago.
The Linux world demands a single trusted vetted repository. Then Linux
can seriously be considered for corporate desktops. It already has
applications like TextMaker and OnlyOffice, etc. What it doesn't have
is a single trusted repository.
What the Linux world currently has is a bunch of AGILE "developers"
hacking on the fly, trusting automated tests that either test nothing
or test the wrong thing, turning stuff into distro specific repos that
busts things all over. Ubuntu has pushed out updates that broke all
wifi networking for users. If your device couldn't support a hard
wired connection you couldn't fix it.
Core run-time like C/C++ major changes or the not that long ago SSL
change trash things.
I've argued for decades that DOS didn't do it wrong. Everything bound
into a single executable was the only way to maintain security and
stability. Here now we have the Linux world trying to not admit shared
libraries (forced out of necessity in the dual floppy days) were
always a bad idea. A high risk shortcut to resource limitations.
The Linux, Windows, and MAC worlds refuse to fix the problem. They
keep dynamically linking and an update that should have no impact on
your application what-so-ever shoots it out of the saddle by replacing
one of your required libraries with an incompatible version.
Snap wasn't the correct idea. Flatpak is. It's basically a better
Docker and now many distros are having their graphical application
installer use Flathub directly.
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2022/02/ubuntu-mate-22-04-flatpak-support
This will increase, not decrease, as the cost and effort each distro
incurs trying to find "volunteers' to be "maintainers" and physically
maintaining their repo has gotten too high.
Why do you think there are so many YABU distros? Someone wants a new
distro for something, they want stability, and they only want to
change a few things (usually packaged applications) for their distro.
That's how Linux Mint and so many others happened.
The Linux world is moving towards Flathub being the one place all
applications exist. All of them allowed to be shown in the GUI
installers will have been vetted by someone at Flathub and have active
malware/virus scans run on them. This is the end to a LibreOffice
update jacking your favorite IDE or PDF viewer by installing an
incompatible library. It has the hope of security.
No offense man, but anybody can get a .whatever URL and post an
downloadable package on it. We in the Linux world have been far too
trusting and burned too often by that. I know that I don't personally
run daily virus/malware scans on the Debian and RPM packages I have
posted. I just replace with newer versions often. Nothing says that
Russia/China/North Korea/insert-nation-here didn't slip in an plant
something.
Today's users and companies are starting to "just use the GUI" to find
their applications. Maybe they won't find yours, but they will find
something close enough. There are thousands of games, text editors,
IDEs, and office packages. Almost all of what you need (perhaps all)
can be found on Flathub now.
---
The "just copy" conversation.
Been a while since I did anything meaningful with Qt because the
medical device and embedded systems world has mostly abandoned it. The
CopperSpice stuff I've been doing like the RedDiamond editor uses hand
edited CMakeLists.txt files. Not as horrible as it sounds.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/reddiamond/
Everything started with the one for the Diamond editor and everyone
just tweaks it for all applications. It copies all of the needed
libraries into the same directory as the executable. (You need to know
what you need and it only copies CopperSpice libraries, not base OS
libraries.) All of the plug-ins are in a subdir under the exe.
This makes things incredibly easy after running LDD on the binary. You
can quickly create your script files to generate Debian and RPM
packages. I have some as part of that project for those who wish to look.
Currently CopperSpice doesn't cleanly compile in the Flatpack world
where they don't want even the slightest warning. Supposed to get
fixed after they get Ubuntu 22.04 compilation warnings cleaned up.
Eventually I will remove all of my Debian and RPM packages and just
have Flatpak. For any "consumer level" app, that's where myself and
those I speak with are all going. We can automatically be included in
distros that will give us access to millions of desktops. They don't
have to stumble into us on the Web.
---
Any linuxdeployqt is still going to have significant issues with all
of those distros using /lib and /lib64 directories. Then you have to
deal with /lib-arm for cross compilation.
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