Why is appimage-builder getting the "INFO:Generator:No desktop entries found" error?

Question

I am following the tutorial for creating an appimage and I am getting this error after building the app and running appimage-builder from inside the docker. Why is it logging "INFO:Generator:No desktop entries found"? I am using this docker from the install instructions "docker pull appimagecrafters/appimage-builder:latest"

root@08ac50810400:/qt-appimage-template# appimage-builder --generate INFO:Generator:Searching AppDir INFO:Generator:Searching desktop entries INFO:Generator:Reading desktop entry: AppDir/usr/share/applications/QtQuickControls2Application.desktop Basic Information : ? ID [Eg: com.example.app] : QtQuickControls2Application ? Application Name : SimpleQtApp ? Icon : QtQuickControls2Application ? Version : latest ? Executable path relative to AppDir [usr/bin/app] : usr/bin/qt-appimage-templat e ? Arguments [Default: $@] : $@ ? Architecture : amd64 INFO:Generator:Analysing application runtime dependencies INFO:Generator:Guessing APT configuration INFO:dpkg-query:/usr/bin/dpkg-query -S /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libXrender.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-util.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpng16.so.16 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-glx.so.0 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libresolv.so.2 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libSM.so.6 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libX11.so.6 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libglib-2.0.so.0 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libnsl.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libQt5Network.so.5 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxkbcommon.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libICE.so.6 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libnss_nis.so.2 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/liblzma.so.5 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libicudata.so.60 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libexpat.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libX11-xcb.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libQt5XcbQpa.so.5 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libXi.so.6 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libnss_dns.so.2 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libXfixes.so.3 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-shape.so.0 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/librt.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgraphite2.so.3 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libQt5Core.so.5 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-shm.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libfontconfig.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-keysyms.so.1 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libm.so.6 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-render-util.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libGL.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libXdmcp.so.6 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-render.so.0 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libc.so.6 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-sync.so.1 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgpg-error.so.0 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libuuid.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-icccm.so.4 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libXau.so.6 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libXcursor.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libGLdispatch.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libGLX.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-xfixes.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libfreetype.so.6 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpthread.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libharfbuzz.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libQt5Gui.so.5 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libz.so.1 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libbsd.so.0 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgcc_s.so.1 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsystemd.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-xkb.so.1 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgcrypt.so.20 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libnss_compat.so.2 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/plugins/xcbglintegrations/libqxcb-glx-integration.so /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libQt5Qml.so.5 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-randr.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/plugins/platforms/libqxcb.so /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libdl.so.2 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/liblz4.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxkbcommon-x11.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/qt5/plugins/platforminputcontexts/libcomposeplatforminputcontextplugin.so /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libicuuc.so.60 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-xinerama.so.0 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libdouble-conversion.so.1 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxcb-image.so.0 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libnss_files.so.2 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpcre.so.3 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libicui18n.so.60 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libQt5DBus.so.5 /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libdbus-1.so.3 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libXext.so.6 INFO:dpkg-query:/usr/bin/dpkg-query -W -f=${binary:Package}: ${Depends}\n libxcb-render-util0 libgcc1 libice6 libxcb-sync1 libgpg-error0 libxkbcommon-x11-0 libqt5dbus5 libxi6 libharfbuzz0b libgcrypt20 liblz4-1 libpcre3 libgraphite2-3 libxcb-util1 libicu60 libxcb-image0 libxkbcommon0 libbsd0 libexpat1 libqt5core5a libxcb-keysyms1 libxdmcp6 libqt5gui5 libxcb-randr0 libdouble-conversion1 zlib1g liblzma5 libc6 libqt5qml5 libpng16-16 libsm6 libxcb-xinerama0 libstdc++6 libxrender1 libxcb-icccm4 libxext6 libglib2.0-0 libxcursor1 libxau6 libxfixes3 libsystemd0 libdbus-1-3 libxcb-xkb1 libqt5network5 libuuid1 INFO:Generator:No desktop entries found Traceback (most recent call last): File "/usr/local/bin/appimage-builder", line 4, in import('pkg_resources').run_script('appimage-builder==0.7.2', 'appimage-builder') File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/pkg_resources/init.py", line 658, in run_script self.require(requires)[0].run_script(script_name, ns) File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/pkg_resources/init.py", line 1438, in run_script exec(code, namespace, namespace) File "/usr/local/lib/python3.6/dist-packages/appimage_builder-0.7.2-py3.6.egg/EGG-INFO/scripts/appimage-builder", line 18, in main() File "/usr/local/lib/python3.6/dist-packages/appimage_builder-0.7.2-py3.6.egg/AppImageBuilder/main.py", line 52, in main generator.generate() File "/usr/local/lib/python3.6/dist-packages/appimage_builder-0.7.2-py3.6.egg/AppImageBuilder/generator/generator.py", line 94, in generate with open(appimage_builder_yml_template_path, 'r') as filedata: FileNotFoundError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/usr/local/lib/python3.6/dist-packages/appimage_builder-0.7.2-py3.6.egg/AppImageBuilder/generator/templates/AppImageBuilder.yml.in'

Answer 1

The problem was I did not install the qt quick controls so the app was not coming up at all and the appimage-builder times out with the error above.

sudo apt install qml-module-qtquick-controls qml-module-qtquick-controls2

Then it worked.

Answer 2

appimage-builder will look for the desktop file in $APPDIR/usr/share/applications. If there are no desktop files there the error is shown.

appimage-builder uses the desktop file to know which is the application main binary that will be executed.