Linux distribution

[nunodonato]

Just got to know about love-linux-distribution, which generates an easy to use linux distribution of a Love game, much like love-release does for win and mac.
https://bitbucket.org/funkeh/love-linux-distribution/overview
would be great to have something like this has an option for linux, besides debian packages

[josefnpat]

I am against this, for many reasons previously mentioned in the love forums.

https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=78361&p=170932&hilit=linux+binary#p170932
https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=78328&p=170693&hilit=linux+binary#p170693
https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=77161&p=162157&hilit=linux+binary#p162157
https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=76728&p=159477&hilit=linux+binary#p159477
https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=75387&hilit=linux+binary&start=10#p155629
https://love2d.org/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=50387&p=127225&hilit=linux+binary#p127225

Distributing binaries and the statically linked libraries is incredibly hard to do correctly cross distro, and I would rather it be done right, than just be a partial solution. You'll notice on funkeh's project that it only supports a small list of distros.

Honestly though, it's more along the *nix way to have dependencies than to supply them. It avoids DLL Hell, reduces points of failure and other things.

While I would love to have a end-all solution to distributing to Linux, funkeh's project does not come close.

[slime73]

statically linked libraries

.so files are Shared Objects (dynamically linked shared libraries.)

Honestly though, it's more along the *nix way to have dependencies than to supply them.

Something like love-linux-distribution is necessary when distributing on Steam or Desura (and likely more platforms like those in the future) for Linux. It would have made my life much less frustrating if this had been available when I was putting my game on Desura.

I do not want to make it harder than it should be to distribute a game on Steam. Sticking to the "repository ideology" over practicality just hurts LÖVE.

[josefnpat]

.so files are Shared Objects (dynamically linked shared libraries.)

My head is an animal today.

Something like love-linux-distribution is necessary when distributing on Steam or Desura (and likely more platforms like those in the future) for Linux.

You make an excellent point; in this case though you have a target distro. e.g. If this is a SteamOS targeted system, then the repo is perfect. Otherwise, it's not fair to call it "linux-distribution".

It would have made my life much less frustrating if this had been available when I was putting my game on Desura.

What platforms does Desura officially support? Perhaps creating forks like love-steamos-build and love-desura-build.

Then again, I wouldn't be against hosting the .so's on my server and adding --static-desura and --static-steamos tags, or something of the likes. I'm not against static binaries, I'm against them being named "Linux" when they obviously don't run on all versions of linux :)

[MisterDA]

So... yes ? No ? Can you repeat the question ?

[josefnpat]

From what I understand; Yes, so long as it's labeled with the target OS. 🐈

e.g. --ubuntu or --steamos

[nunodonato]

any updates on this? I just came back to this problem again when trying to play an old game that doesn't work with version 0.10

[MisterDA]

Take a look at Alloyed/flirt (forum), it might help you for now.

[ahrnbom]

From Ubuntu 16.04 onwards, Ubuntu supports .snap packages (https://developer.ubuntu.com/en/snappy/build-apps/). Maybe that could be an alternative? They have all their dependencies built-in.

[MisterDA]

There's also the xdg-app project (freedesktop / gnome)

[karai17]

It would be nice to have a tool that spits out both .deb and .rpm files. I believe that coves a very large portion of the Linux userbase (the entire Debian family,including Ubuntu, and the entire redhat family).

[pablomayobre]

There has been some effort in the issue tracker to try and find some ways around Linux distribution, it would be good to track progress of the issue #1168 at the LÖVE repo

[popey]

@ahrnbom I recently made a template to make it easier for developers to package their LÖVE games as snaps. This does indeed bundle in the necessary libraries to allow the snap to be installed and remove independently of the base system. It could be used by love-release in its entirety or portions of.

https://github.com/popey/love-snap-template

[pablomayobre]

@nunodonato There is no reason to close this issue, if you don't want to be notified it would be better if you unsuscribe instead of closing it. The issue is still relevant

[karai17]

@popey how about appimage? :)

[nunodonato]

@positive07 you are right, sorry, re-opening.

[technomancy]

I just used love-linux-builder by love core team member bartbes which worked really well to create an AppImage: https://bitbucket.org/bartbes/love-linux-builder/src/66e3f6735fa2fb4ca77c9e257d4cfc738a383ae3/Getting%20Started.md?fileviewer=file-view-default

It would be great to see this integrated into love-release, I think.

[technomancy]

I'd be up for submitting a patch to start supporting AppImages if you're interested.

[pablomayobre]

That would be great! you should totally go for it

[technomancy]

@positive07 thanks; are you speaking as a potential user or someone who actually has the authority to accept a contribution if I were to make it?

[MisterDA]

He was speaking as a potential user (aren't we all?), but I have the authority to accept a contribution, and I will. It would be terrific to add support for AppImages !

[jffaust]

It's been a while.. but has there been any progress on this? Or maybe alternatives?

[MisterDA]

It's been a while.. but has there been any progress on this? Or maybe alternatives?

I’m not developing love-release actively anymore, but if someone writes patches I'll happily review them.