Freedesktop SDK

The Freedesktop SDK project provides Platform and SDK runtimes for Flatpak apps and runtimes based on Freedesktop modules. It was originally started as a Flatpak subproject to create a basic-neutral runtime. It is now a separate project, similar to what happened with the GNOME and KDE runtimes.

As explained in Alex's blog post there has long been a desire to upgrade and modernize the SDK, which is where this specific project comes into the story.

This is a diagram of how the Freedeskop SDK runtimes interact with the rest of the Flatpak ecosystem:

graph TD;
app(Flatpak Application) --> GNOME_SDK(GNOME SDK.);
GNOME_SDK(GNOME SDK.) --> freedesktop-sdk(freedesktop-sdk);
app(Flatpak Application) --> freedesktop-sdk(freedesktop-sdk);
app(Flatpak Application) --> KDE_SDK(KDE SDK);
KDE_SDK(KDE SDK) --> freedesktop-sdk(freedesktop-sdk);
freedesktop-sdk(freedesktop-sdk) --> linux(Linux-based OS)
freedesktop-sdk(freedesktop-sdk) --> container(Docker container)
style app fill:#f9f,stroke:#333,stroke-width:2px
style KDE_SDK fill:#591,stroke:#333,stroke-width:2px
style GNOME_SDK fill:#591,stroke:#333,stroke-width:2px
style freedesktop-sdk fill:#ee4,stroke:#333,stroke-width:2px

Our goals, some of which are already achieved:

• Improve maintainability, using a single metadata format instead of several different ones. We use BuildStream for this.
• Support multiple architectures out of the box. (armv7, aarch64, i386, and x86_64)
• Long term maintenance of the SDK, with improved automation to do so, including tests for ABI stability.
• Define formal release cycles.
• Host on official freedesktop.org infrastructure.
• Add minimal bootable system and generic sysroot.
• Maintain a neutral baseline which can be consumed by Flatpak, GNOME, KDE and any other interested project.

Usage

Currently the Freedesktop SDK is meant to be used as the base for all Flatpak applications.

We recommend you install releases from Flathub.

The current set of commands to run your application with 18.08 are:

1. Install the new runtimes:

   $ flatpak remote-add --if-not-exists flathub https://flathub.org/repo/flathub.flatpakrepo $ flatpak install flathub org.freedesktop.Sdk//18.08 $ flatpak install flathub org.freedesktop.Platform//18.08

2. Set your app manifest:

   "runtime-version": "18.08"

3. Build and run your flatpak app as usual:

   $ flatpak-builder build_folder org.app.json $ flatpak-builder --run build_folder org.app.json

Available Runtimes

Currently we provide the following runtimes: * org.freedesktop.Platform * org.freedesktop.Sdk

Additionally we provide the following extensions to our platform: * org.freedesktop.Platform.Locale * org.freedesktop.Platform.VAAPI.Intel (Intel only) * org.freedesktop.Platform.html5-codecs * org.freedesktop.Platform.Compat.{architecture}

And the following extensions to the SDK: * org.freedesktop.Sdk.Locale * org.freedesktop.Sdk.Docs * org.freedesktop.Sdk.Debug * org.freedesktop.Sdk.Extension.rust-stable

We also provide org.freedesktop.GlxInfo and org.freedesktop.GlxInfo.Debug as flatpak applications.

Structure

Current directory structure is the usual of a builstream project with the exception of the bootstrap/ folder which contains a buildstream subproject with a set of instructions to bootstrap a minimal sysroot, used to build all the Flatpak runtimes defined in the elements/ folder.

The plugins/ directory contains our custom Buildstream plugins

Contributing

For a guide to contributing, please see our CONTRIBUTING file.

Acknowledgements

This project wouldn't be possible without the work of a few individuals and groups, and we would like to take a moment to thank them.

• Alex Larsson, who not only gave us Flatpak but also the original Freedesktop Sdk (versions 1.2 to 1.6);
• the wider Flatpak community, of which we are only a small part, and who constantly help us;
• the BuildStream community, who offered this amazing tool to the world which makes building and maintaining our project so easy and fun;
• Dodji Seketeli who wrote libabigail, which allows us to ensure we do not break apps, and tirelessly works with us on fixing any bug we encounter;
• Codethink, for assigning some of their engineers's time to this project;