Publish Desktop versions

[fmasa]

Rationale

1. When prepping the game sessions, I'd usually rather use the PC over the phone/tablet and I suspect that would be the same for other GMs. Thus it would be useful to have an easy way to run WFRP Master (or at least a subset of its features) on non-Android devices.

2. Some players may not have an Android device, but the GM may still want to benefit from a unified system to manage the Characters, Combats, etc.

Approach

Apart from the Android version, this repository also contains working code for the Desktop (JVM) version.

There are a few last features missing:

• Avatar image uploads
• Refresh token expiration is not handled and an expired refresh token leads to an app crash
• Errors are not reported anywhere (What about using Sentry?)

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CI should build versions for Windows and Linux (see the section below for macOS) and attach these artifacts to the current release.
These will support automatic updates (using Hydraulic Conveyor).

Linux version

Simple statically linked binary should suffi

Other considerations

Problems with macOS

Currently, apps used by macOS must be notarized. Notarization requires Apple Developer Account which costs $99 per year.

If you are an Apple developer and would be interested in publishing WFRP Master using your Apple Developer Account, please get in touch 🙂

If no other option exists, unnotarized builds or JARs should be provided for x68_64 and arm machines.

Web version?

There is experimental support for Jetpack Compose for Web using the same canvas-based approach as the JVM and Android version uses. I do not actively plan to pursue this avenue yet, but this could be the better solution when this becomes mature.

[fmasa]

Binaries for all Windows, Linux and MacOS are now available as of #89.

These are not notarized for now and authentication still requires password (which regular users do not have), but it's a step 🙂

[Joly0]

Hey, i am interested, is it somehow already possible to test those desktop versions (in my case for windows)?

[fmasa]

@Joly0 Take a look at #189 (comment).

[fmasa]

@TheoKDK : I have tried the PC version that you sent me via the link, but it is impossible for me to install the Windows version... I tried the Mac intel version, same thing. The M1 works though.

@TheoKDK Sorry for moving the discussion, but I would like to contain desktop version issues to a single place
How does the installation fail?

[fmasa]

@TheoKDK I don't have access to macOS devices, but I just tried installation in Windows and it worked, so I would need more details 🙂

[TheoKDK]

@fmasa Hello, I'm sorry I got caught up at work and didn't have time to look at the application again.
Well, I launch the .exe, Windows puts me on alert about the software, I tell it to run anyway, WFRP opens with the loading bar, then nothing, the installation tab closes and then nothing.

[fmasa]

@TheoKDK No worries, I just got a bit of time in Windows to check it out. 🙂

For me, it works as follows:

1. The system warns me about the software (this is because the binary is not signed by a valid certificate)
2. The WFRP Master installer starts
3. The app opens a dialog stating that PowerShell wants to make changes to the device

It seems that you didn't get the permissions dialog (3).

Can you let me know:

• Which Windows version do you use
• What type of Windows user/profile do you use (is this an administrator account or a "regular" account?)
• Do subsequent runs behave the same way?

I'll try to dig deeper 🙂

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Also, I don't want to discourage you, the desktop app is generally stable and working, but since 99%+ of users just use the Android app, the desktop app is maintained on a best-effort basis (for now at least) and is generally less polished. As I mentioned before, I heavily use it myself, but only on Linux right now, so I may miss issues that only happen on Windows.

[TheoKDK]

I'm using Windows 10 Pro and normally it's an administrator account (I only have one account on the computer).
I have this :

And :

And nothing more

[fmasa]

@TheoKDK Could you try MSIX installer (or even .appinstaller) as well please? It's on the same download page, below the large button.

I suspect that this might be a problem with downloads from Github Pages (EXE is just small installer that downloads the whole app from Github Pages).

[TheoKDK]

When i'm using this one I can't click on install...

[Joly0]

Btw, i have an issue with the exe aswell. When i try to run it, i get this error message after some time loading:

The zipped version with the exe in the bin folder however works no problem (although it takes forever to load/start the program)

[Joly0]

Btw, for msix i get the exact same error message

and same for appinstaller:

So looks like somewhere for the exe/msix/appinstaller the certificate could not be verified and therefore we are unable to install it. The zipped version doesnt have this issues, as it doesnt get installed

[fmasa]

Thanks, both of you! Clearly there is a problem with installation of unsigned applications (curious, it works sometimes).
So for now the only way is the ZIP 😞

I will take a look at publishing to Microsoft Store as the price is at least acceptable (it's one-time $20 fee compared to hundreds of dollars per year for signing certificate), but it will take a while.

[PABessero]

Hi there, did you find a fix for the app installations?

[fmasa]

@PABessero Not yet, the end goal is getting the app to Microsoft Store, but this currently has low priority. You should be able to download the ZIP distribution in the meantime.