nw-builder

Build your NW.js apps for Mac, Win and Linux programmatically or via CLI.

Installation

Local

npm install nw-builder --save-dev

Global

npm install nw-builder -g

Grunt and Gulp Plugins

Yes, there is also a Grunt Plugin. For Gulp, just use the module :)

CLI Usage

Usage: nwbuild [options] [path]

Options:
  -p, --platforms      Platforms to build, comma-sperated, can be: win32,win64,osx32,osx64,linux32,linux64   ['osx64', 'win32', 'win64']
  -v, --version        The nw version, eg. 0.8.4                                             [default: "latest"]
  -r, --run            Runs NW.js for the current platform                                   [default: false]
  -o, --buildDir       The build folder                                                      [default: "./build"]
  -f, --forceDownload  Force download of NW.js                                               [default: false]
  --cacheDir           The cache folder
  --quiet              Disables logging                                                      [default: false]

Run NW.js

During development you can run NW.js with nwbuild -r path/to/your/younwapp/

Module Usage

var NwBuilder = require('nw-builder');
var nw = new NwBuilder({
    files: './path/to/nwfiles/**/**', // use the glob format
    platforms: ['osx64', 'win32', 'win64'],
    version: '0.14.6'
});

// Log stuff you want
nw.on('log',  console.log);

nw.build().then(function () {
   console.log('all done!');
}).catch(function (error) {
    console.error(error);
});

During development you can run NW.js with run:

nw.run().then(function () {
   console.log('all done!');
}).catch(function (error) {
    console.error(error);
});

build and run also supports callbacks:

nw.build(function(err) {
    if(err) return console.error(err);
    console.log('all done!');
});

Options

options.files Required

Type: String
Default value: null

The path to your node webkit app. It supports simple-glob so you can do stuff like ['foo/*.js', '!foo/bar.js', 'foo/bar.js'].

options.version

Type: String
Default value: 'latest'

The version of NW.js you want to use. Per default it looks up the latest version. Here is a list of all available releases

options.flavor

Type: String
Default value: 'sdk'

The flavor of NW.js you want to use. Per default it will be sdk. Here is a list of all flavor available.

The value sdk is most used for development whereas normal for production.

options.platforms

Type: Array
Default value: ['osx64', 'win32', 'win64']

The platforms you want to build. Can be ['win32', 'win64', 'osx32', 'osx64', 'linux32', 'linux64']

The values ['win', 'osx', 'linux'] can also be used and will build both the 32 and 64 bit versions of the specified platforms.

Be aware that the osx32 version can only be built with legacy version of nwjs. Since > 0.12.0, only 64 bits for osx works.

options.appName

Type: String
Default value: false

The Name of your NW.js app. If this value is set to null, it will autodetect the name from your projects package.json. This will be used to generate a plist file for mac.

options.appVersion

Type: String
Default value: false

The version of your NW.js app. If this value is set to null, it will autodetect the version form your projects package.json. This will be used to generate a plist file for mac.

options.buildDir

Type: String
Default value: ./build

This is where the releases are saved.

options.cacheDir

Type: String
Default value: ./cache

This is where the cached NW.js downloads are

options.buildType

Type: String or function Default value: default

How you want to save your build.

• default [appName]
• versioned [appName] -v[appVersion]
• timestamped [appName] - [timestamp];
• A function with options as scope (e.g function () {return this.appVersion;} )

options.forceDownload

Type: Boolean
Default value: false

This will delete everything in your build_dir directory, including the cached downloaded prebuilt binaries

options.macCredits

Type: String
Default value: false

MAC ONLY: The path to your credits.html file. If your don't provide your own it will use the one provided by NW.js

options.macIcns

Type: String
Default value: false

MAC ONLY: The path to your ICNS icon file. If your don't provide your own it will use the one provided by NW.js

options.zip

Type: Boolean
Default value: null

WINDOW ONLY: Instead of zipping the application and merging it into the executable the application content is placed next to the application (which speed up the startup time for large apps). The default behaviour is platform specific. For windows and linux, the application is zipped and merged into the executable. For mac, the application is not zipped.

options.zipOptions

Type: Object
Default value: null

Allows to configure the underling zip library parameters, like store or compression ratio.

See archiver documentation for detailed description of properties.

options.macPlist

Type: String or Object
Default value: false

MAC ONLY: Pass a string containing the path to your own plist file. If a string isn't passed, a plist file will be generated from your package.json. Pass an object to overwrite or add properties to the generated plist file.

options.winVersionString

Type: Object Default value: {}

WINDOWS ONLY: Some descriptors of the executable. If your don't provide your own FileDescription, it will default to options.appName. If you are building on MAC or LINUX you must have Wine installed to use this option.

See the MSDN docs for more options than the basic list below,

winVersionString: {
  'CompanyName': 'Some Company',
  'FileDescription': 'Process Name',
  'ProductName': 'Some Product',
  'LegalCopyright': 'Copyright 2017',
}

options.winIco

Type: String
Default value: null

WINDOWS ONLY: The path to your ICO icon file. If your don't provide your own it will use the one provided by NW.js. If you are building on MAC or LINUX you must have Wine installed to use this option.

options.macZip (DEPRECATED)

Type: Boolean
Default value: null

MAC ONLY: Use a app.nw folder instead of ZIP file, this significantly improves the startup speed of applications on mac, since no decompressing is needed. Builds on other platforms will still use ZIP files. The default behaviour of node-webkit-builder is to not use ZIP files on the mac platform. In case of the mac platform the option macZip can override the option zip.

Manifest Options

platformOverrides

Allows you to specify platform-specific manifest values. Example manifest:

{
    "name": "nw-demo",
    "version": "0.1.0",
    "main": "index.html",
    "window": {
        "frame": false,
        "toolbar": false
    },
    "platformOverrides": {
        "win": {
            "window": {
                "toolbar": true
            }
        },
        "win32": {
            "window": {
                "frame": true,
                "toolbar": false
            }
        },
        "win64": {
            "window": {
                "frame": true
            }
        },
        "osx": {
            ...
        },
        "osx32": {
            ...
        },
        "osx64": {
            ...
        },
        "linux": {
            ...
        },
        "linux32": {
            ...
        },
        "linux64": {
            ...
        },
    }

The platform-specific options will override the others only when building that platform only and the platformOverrides property will be removed.

For example, when building for Windows, the manifest generated and put into the end app (from the manifest above) would be:

{
    "name": "nw-demo",
    "version": "0.1.0",
    "main": "index.html",
    "window": {
        "frame": true,
        "toolbar": false
    }
}

Additionally, when specifying multiple version of the same platform such as "win", "win32", and "win64", changes will be applied such that "win" applies to both "win32" and "win64", while "win32" and "win64" apply only to the specified version. Also note that "win32" and "win64" can further override changes made in "win".

See #85 and #94 for more information. If you need this during development too, see platform-overrides and gulp-platform-overrides. There is no Grunt plugin, yet.

Troubleshooting

OSX ulimit

Darwin (OS X kernel) has a low limit for file descriptors (256 per process) by default, so you might get an EMFILE error or an error mentioning "too many open files" if youtry to open more file descriptors than this.

To get around it, run ulimit -n 1024 (or add it to your ~/.bash_profile). For more information, see henvic/osx-ulimit.

Team

Current

• Christopher Bradshaw (@kitsune7)
• You? :smile:. We're open to contributions (to the code, documentation, or anything else) and or additional maintainers.

Past

• Steffen Müller (@steffenmllr) (Creator)
• Gabe Paez (@gabepaez)
• Andy Trevorah (@trevorah)
• Adam Lynch (@adam-lynch)
• Rémy Boulanouar (@DblK)

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md.

Release History

See CHANGELOG.md.

License

MIT License