I'm creating a portable Electron app that writes some files to the program folder. It works pretty well when I package it without the --asar option in Electron-packager, which leaves the resources folder with plain html + js files.
Now when I try to compile it with the --asar option, so that it packages the resources folder into one file, I can't access the program directory any more with the following code:
remote.app.getAppPath()
This now returns the path of the asar file, so I can't really write to the application folder any more. Is there any way around this?
No, you cannot modify the asar of a running Electron app. You should be saving your config outside of the asar path.
Related
I have an electron application that I'm packaging up with electron-builder.
Within that application there is a distribution of an exe that I want to be able to call from electron.
The build section of my package.json includes an asarUnpack property, like so:
"asarUnpack": [
"**/node_modules/dist-myexe.exe/**/*",
],
This means that when my application is installed, the exe is extracted under
C:\Program Files\MyElectronApp\resources\app.asar.unpacked\node_modules\myexe.exe\vendor\myexe.exe.
However, when I attempt to child-process.spawn on that exe, windows attempts to run a version from:
%APPDATA%\Local\Temp\par-blahblahblah\cache-blahblahblah\myexe.exe
I'm wondering if this is related to: https://github.com/electron/electron/issues/12092
Is this expected behaviour for electron apps? How can I target the exe that is in Program Files instead?
The exe I was trying to execute on was exiftool.exe, which is actually the culprit extracting to Temp, not electron.
I've been trying to add additional functionality to the electron installer, where I copy some files that are packaged inside the installer, but I receive a non-descriptive error when I try to compile my electron project to create the installer i.e. I get:
* writing effective config
* packaging
* building
x [object Object]
Here is what my script looks like:
!macro customInstall
Rename "$APPDATA\myfolder\img" "$APPDATA\myfolder\img-old"
SetOutPath "$APPDATA\myfolder"
File /nonfatal /a /r "additional_files\*"
CreateShortcut "$SMSTARTUP\mylink.lnk" "$INSTDIR\mylink.exe"
!macroend
Basically everything works except the file copy part. When I remove that part the project builds and compiles into an installer with no problems.
I've also tried to use CopyFiles instead of SetOutPath and File and it works as expected when I place the additional_files folder into the same folder as the installation (dist folder), but I want the folder to be packaged inside the installer. However, I cannot get the additional_files to be packaged with the installation.
I believe it's a location issue, that is, that the NSIS script cannot locate the additional_files/ folder. I've tried modifying the package.json file by adding to the files section the additional_files/ folder and placing it in the root of the project.
I've even tried placing it in the build folder where my installer.nsh script resides, but with no luck.
File looks for files relative to the directory where the .nsi is by default. /NOCD can be used to prevent that but I'm not sure if electron uses that switch.
!cd can be used inside a script to change the directory but I'm not sure if that is going to help you much in this case unless you are willing to use a absolute path and in that case you could just use the absolute path with the File instruction instead.
If you only know where your .nsh file is I suppose you could try File /r "${__FILEDIR__}\additional_files\*"
if you are using electron-builder you have two options inside the settings
extraResources this will copy files into the $INST_DIR/resources folder in your app (this is where the app.asar file is too), and you can access via process.resourcesPath, ex:
extraResources: [
{ from: './dist/ThirdPartyNotices.txt', to: 'ThirdPartyNotices.txt' },
]
extraFiles this would do the same but place the files into the $INST_DIR root folder of your installation ex:
extraFiles: [
{ from: './distrib/mytool.exe', to: 'mytool.exe' },
],
to get the root folder you can use something like remote.app.getAppPath().replace('resources\\app.asar', '').replace('resources/app.asar', '');
all info on: https://www.electron.build/configuration/configuration#overridable-per-platform-options
I need to keep some files (like my data.db file) when installing electron app, I can copy and paste it after installation of .exe, but is better to have it by default.
Is the a way to configure electron builder to keep files or directories after installation in the installation path?
Solved using the extraFiles option: https://www.electron.build/configuration/contents#extrafiles
If you want to keep certain folders when updating an Electron app, you can use the asarUnpack field in the app's package.json file. The asarUnpack field specifies a list of glob patterns that match the files and directories that should be unpacked when the app is packaged as an ASAR (Atom Shell Archive).
For example, to keep the assets and node_modules directories when updating the app, you can add the following lines to the package.json file:
"asarUnpack": [
"assets/*",
"node_modules/*"
]
This will cause the assets and node_modules directories to be extracted to a separate folder when the app is packaged, and they will not be overwritten when the app is updated.
Note that the asarUnpack field is only used when packaging the app as an ASAR. If you are not using ASAR packaging, you can use a different approach to preserve certain directories during updates.
I want to make Dart app that has flexible deployment. It can be started as a web server or standalone app in browser as well. My directory structure:
bin
- httpserver.dart
lib
- commonlib.dart
web
- web.html
- web.dart
pubspec.yaml
I wanto start either httpserver.dart providing web's content or web.html directly in Chromium. I have troubles with the lib visibility from bin/httpserver.dart. using the "import 'package:prj/commonlib.dart'" does not work. But from the web.dart is works fine.
Please advice how to share libs among bin's and web's code. Or I should I make structure of dirs somehow different?
Note: there is no packages sub-dir in the bin directory created by pub get. I am using dart sdk 1.7.2.
Thank you, Ladislav.
In the bin directory there should be a packages symlink created automatically but it is not in subdirectories of prj/bin. If the symlink isn't created just create it manually.
I downloaded LuaEdit to use as an IDE and debug tool however I'm having trouble using it for even the simplest things. I've created a solution with 2 files in it, all of which are stored in the same folder. My files are as follows:
--startup.lua
require("foo")
test("Testing", "testing", "one, two, three")
--foo.lua
foo = {}
print("In foo.lua")
function test(a,b,c) print(a,b,c) end
This works fine when in my C++ compiler when accessed through some embed code, however when I attempt to use the same code in LuaEdit, it crashes on line 3 require("foo") with an error stating:
module 'foo' not found:
no field package.preload['foo']
no file 'C:\Program Files (x86)\LuaEdit 2010\lua\foo.lua'
no file 'C:\Program Files (x86)\LuaEdit 2010\lua\foo\init.lua'
no file 'C:\Program Files (x86)\LuaEdit 2010\foo.lua'
no file 'C:\Program Files (x86)\LuaEdit 2010\foo\init.lua'
no file '.\foo.lua'
no file 'C:\Program Files (x86)\LuaEdit 2010\foo.dll'
no file 'C:\Program Files (x86)\LuaEdit 2010\loadall.dll'
no file '.\battle.dll'
I have also tried creating these files prior to adding them to a solution and still get the same error. Is there some setting I'm missing? It would be great to have an IDE/debugger but it's useless to me if it can't run linked functions.
The issue is probably that your Lua files are not on the path in package.path (for C files this is package.cpath).
My guess is that the LuaEdit program is not launched in the directory you have your files in, and hence does not have a match for eg .\foo.lua.
You have 3 simple solutions to this (from dumb to smarter):
Find out what path LuaEdit considers as ./ and put your files there.
Open up a terminal in the right directory (the one containing your files), and run LuaEdit from there.
Add the path the files are on to package.path and package.cpath before doing any require's
You may need to put:
lua
package.path = package.path..";c:/path/to/my/files/?.lua"
at the beginning of your files before any require (as jpjacobs indicated). I couldn't find any way to provide this from LuaEdit itself. It appears it runs the script using its full path, but keeps its current dir set to whatever it was when the IDE was started. If you run LuaEdit using full path from your application folder, it should work fine even without package.path changes.
While the IDE itself works fine with its own modules/libraries, it doesn't mean it makes them available to the application it runs.
(shameless plug) If you're still not happy with LuaEdit, I'd offer ZeroBrane Studio Lua IDE as an alternative, It's based on the same wxLua framework, but provides a bit more functionality and doesn't have this particular issue you're facing. It also supports remote debugging, so you should be able to debug your Lua scripts directly from your application.