Rockbox Technical Forums

Installation / Removal => Rockbox Utility => Topic started by: shabu on November 08, 2019, 07:15:03 AM

Title: rbutil appimage
Post by: shabu on November 08, 2019, 07:15:03 AM
appimages under linux offer a wide range of advantages for distributing portable, desktop-agnostic applications without the need of extra software to be installed.

https://github.com/AppImage/AppImageKit


    Applications packaged as an AppImage can run on many distributions (including Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE, CentOS, elementaryOS, Linux Mint, and others)
    One app = one file = super simple for users: just download one AppImage file, make it executable, and run
    No unpacking or installation necessary
    No root needed
    No system libraries changed
    Works out of the box, no installation of runtimes needed
    Optional desktop integration with appimaged
    Optional binary delta updates, e.g., for continuous builds (only download the binary diff) using AppImageUpdate
    Can optionally GPG2-sign your AppImages (inside the file)
    Works on Live ISOs
    Can use the same AppImages when dual-booting multiple distributions
    Can be listed in the AppImageHub central directory of available AppImages
    Can double as a self-extracting compressed archive with the --appimage-extract parameter


i am really amazed by this format, seems so superior in comparison to snaps or even flatpaks. how about packaging rbutil as an appimage in the future?
Title: Re: rbutil appimage
Post by: bluebrother on November 24, 2019, 02:12:47 PM
i am really amazed by this format, seems so superior in comparison to snaps or even flatpaks. how about packaging rbutil as an appimage in the future?

Feel free to contribute. Mentioning it in other threads won't get things done. And obviously no developer has enough interest to work on it (if it was me I would even stop distributing a binary for Linux these days. But that's my personal opinion ...)

Though if we have an AppImage we might also need a Snap and a FlatPack ...
Title: Re: rbutil appimage
Post by: shabu on November 24, 2019, 02:35:57 PM
why stick and worry so much about a personal impression? if it sounds too much fanboyesque, will removing my opinion change all for good out of a sudden?

in fact, i actually prefer trad repos, but with appimages i also see advantages in certain use cases. and i really like that format, that is all.

criticizing people for not contributing is absolutely out of place. i would have done so, as you can imagine, but please keep in mind that not everyone here around is a coder, automagically.
Title: Re: rbutil appimage
Post by: gevaerts on November 24, 2019, 05:11:32 PM
criticizing people for not contributing is absolutely out of place.

It would be indeed, luckily nobody did that here. However, I did see someone being critisised for not immediately doing work that someone else suggested, and that's equally unacceptable I think.
Title: Re: rbutil appimage
Post by: shabu on November 25, 2019, 03:31:10 AM
i am really amazed by this format, seems so superior in comparison to snaps or even flatpaks. how about packaging rbutil as an appimage in the future?
Feel free to contribute.

ok, then how is this to be interpreted in the given context here?

criticizing people for not contributing is absolutely out of place.
However, I did see someone being critisised for not immediately doing work that someone else suggested, and that's equally unacceptable I think.

would you mind explaining this in detail, please?
Title: Re: rbutil appimage
Post by: shabu on November 26, 2019, 03:48:44 AM
ok, i don't want any bad blood arising here. this was just meant to be a proposal (say my contribution in this case), not more or less.

if there is no interrest in it or priorites along other shores, then it is abolutely fine. there is more important things to life than this.

keep up the rockbox flame

pax vobiscum
Title: Re: rbutil appimage
Post by: gevaerts on November 26, 2019, 06:07:10 AM
ok, i don't want any bad blood arising here. this was just meant to be a proposal (say my contribution in this case), not more or less.

if there is no interrest in it or priorites along other shores, then it is abolutely fine. there is more important things to life than this.

keep up the rockbox flame

pax vobiscum

On re-reading, I see I was a bit hasty with my earlier response, so I apologise for that.

The main problem here isn't really even priorities, it's that the number of people actively working on rockbox is orders of magnitude smaller than it was ten years ago. A day with ten commits was once a slow day, nowadays we have one or two per week, or even less. The reality is that interest in standalone DAPs has seriously dropped.
Title: Re: rbutil appimage
Post by: shabu on November 26, 2019, 07:10:38 AM
no worries, all good.

yes, i see your point and know what you are up to.

tbh, i do not understand the growing desinterrest in daps these days. let's face it, mobile phones, very often lack a lot of features and to me, are no alternatives to a classic dap or even rb. this is also the reason for posting about ubuntu touch in the new ports section.

if it is all about phones these days, this would be one of the few systems that i would put my trust in. it is open source, privacy-respecting and very easy to install -- the number of supported devices should also raise in the future.

i also very much like the idea of giving older hardware a second chance and it really runs fine on aged devices, too. obiously the software is not so demanding, as with linux in general which is very positive.

on the other hand, turning rb into a touch friendly clickapp is probably quite a step to take as well and needs more manpower, as you mentioned before.

all of this, once more, is the strict personal opinion of mine :)