Reputation: 1900
I am trying to include a precompiled binary with an electron app. I began with electron quick start app and modified my renderer.js
file to include this code that is triggered when a file is dropped on the body:
spawn = require('child_process').spawn,
ffmpeg = spawn('node_modules/.bin/ffmpeg', ['-i', clips[0], '-an', '-q:v', '1', '-vcodec', 'libx264', '-y', '-pix_fmt', 'yuv420p', '-vf', 'setsar=1,scale=trunc(iw/2)*2:trunc(ih/2)*2,crop=in_w:in_h-50:0:50', '/tmp/out21321.mp4']);
ffmpeg.stdout.on('data', data => {
console.log(`stdout: ${data}`);
});
ffmpeg.stderr.on('data', data => {
console.log(`stderr: ${data}`);
});
I have placed my precompiled ffmpeg binary in node_modules/.bin/
. Everything works great in the dev panel, but when I use electron-packager to set up the app, it throws a spawn error ENOENT
to the console when triggered. I did find a very similar question on SO, but the question doesn't seem to be definitively answered. The npm page on electron-packager does show that they can be bundled, but I cannot find any documentation on how to do so.
Upvotes: 22
Views: 12640
Reputation: 1345
This is how I would do it:
Taking cues from tsuriga's answer, here is my code:
Note: replace or add OS path accordingly.
'use strict'; import path from 'path'; import { remote } from 'electron'; import getPlatform from './get-platform'; const IS_PROD = process.env.NODE_ENV === 'production'; const root = process.cwd(); const { isPackaged, getAppPath } = remote.app; const binariesPath = IS_PROD && isPackaged ? path.join(path.dirname(getAppPath()), '..', './Resources', './bin') : path.join(root, './resources', getPlatform(), './bin'); export const execPath = path.resolve(path.join(binariesPath, './exec-file-name'));
'use strict'; import { platform } from 'os'; export default () => { switch (platform()) { case 'aix': case 'freebsd': case 'linux': case 'openbsd': case 'android': return 'linux'; case 'darwin': case 'sunos': return 'mac'; case 'win32': return 'win'; } };
"build": { .... "extraFiles": [ { "from": "resources/mac/bin", "to": "Resources/bin", "filter": [ "**/*" ] } ], .... },
import { execPath } from './binaries'; #your program code: var command = spawn(execPath, arg, {});
Why this is better?
Most of the answers require an additional package called app-root-dir
The original answer doesn't handle the (env=production) build or the pre-packed versions properly. He/she has only taken care of development and post-packaged versions.
Upvotes: 3
Reputation: 199
I know I'm a bit late but just wanted to mention ffbinaries
npm package I created a while ago exactly for this purpose.
It'll allow you to download ffmpeg/ffplay/ffserver/ffprobe binaries to specified location either during application boot (so you don't need to bundle it with your application) or in a CI setup. It can autodetect platform, you can also specify it manually.
Upvotes: 6
Reputation: 2669
The problem is that electron-builder
or electron-packager
will bundle your dependency into the asar
file. It seems that if the dependency has a binary into node_modules/.bin
it is smart enough to not package it.
This is the documentation for asar packaging for electron-builder
on that topic. It says
Node modules, that must be unpacked, will be detected automatically
I understand that it is related to existing binaries in node_modules/.bin
.
If the module you are using is not automatically unpacked you can disable asar
archiving completely or explicitly tell electron-builder
to not pack certain files. You do so in your package.json
file like this:
"build": {
"asarUnpack": [
"**/app/node_modules/some-module/*"
],
I ran into the same issue with ffmpeg
and this is what I've done:
ffmpeg-static
. This package bundles statically compiled ffmpeg binaries for Windows, Mac and Linux. It also provides a way to get the full path of the binary for the OS you are running: require('ffmpeg-static').path
Tell electron-builder
to not pack the ffmpeg-static
module:
"build": { "asarUnpack": [ "**/app/node_modules/ffmpeg-static/*" ],
Now we need to slightly change the code to get the right path to ffmpeg
with this code: require('ffmpeg-static').path.replace('app.asar', 'app.asar.unpacked')
(if we are in development the replace()
won't replace anything which is fine).
I ran into the issue that require('ffmpeg-static').path
was returning a relative path in the renderer process. But the issue seemed to be that webpack changes the way the module is required and that prevents ffmpeg-static
to provide a full path. In the Dev Tools the require('ffmpeg-static').path
was working fine when run manually, but when doing the same in the bundled code I was always getting a relative path. So this is what I did.
BrowserWindow
: global.ffmpegpath = require('ffmpeg-static').path.replace('app.asar', 'app.asar.unpacked')
. The code that runs in the main process is not bundled by webpack so I always get a full path with this code.require('electron').remote.getGlobal('ffmpegpath')
Upvotes: 39
Reputation: 1900
If anyone happens to need an answer to this question: I do have a solution to this, but I have no idea if this is considered best practice. I couldn't find any good documentation for including 3rd party precompiled binaries, so I just fiddled with it until it finally worked. Here's what I did (starting with the electron quick start, node.js v6):
From the app directory I ran the following commands to include the ffmpeg binary as a module:
mkdir node_modules/ffmpeg
cp /usr/local/bin/ffmpeg node_modules/ffmpeg/
ln -s ../ffmpeg/ffmpeg node_modules/.bin/ffmpeg
(replace /usr/local/bin/ffmpeg with your current binary path, download it from here) Placing the link allowed electron-packager to include the binary I saved to node_modules/ffmpeg/.
Then to get the bundled app path I installed the npm package app-root-dir by running the following command:
npm i -S app-root-dir
Since I could then get the app path, I just appended the subfolder for my binary and spawned from there. This is the code that I placed in renderer.js:.
var appRootDir = require('app-root-dir').get();
var ffmpegpath=appRootDir+'/node_modules/ffmpeg/ffmpeg';
console.log(ffmpegpath);
const
spawn = require( 'child_process' ).spawn,
ffmpeg = spawn( ffmpegpath, ['-i',clips_input[0]]); //add whatever switches you need here
ffmpeg.stdout.on( 'data', data => {
console.log( `stdout: ${data}` );
});
ffmpeg.stderr.on( 'data', data => {
console.log( `stderr: ${data}` );
});
Upvotes: 2