Standalone wine builds in AppImage format

[probonopd]

(Continuation from ferion11/Proton_Appimage#2 (comment))

Providing standalone wine builds in AppImage format would have several advantages. It is a frequently discussed/requested topic in the forums.

In a nutshell, we would have a single executable file that could run w32 apps on 64-bit Linux systems without the need for any 32-bit libraries to be installed on the target system.

Proof-of-concept:

• https://github.com/Hackerl/Wine_Appimage/releases/tag/continuous
• https://github.com/ferion11/Proton_Appimage/releases/tag/continuous

In a second step, we could use the same methodology to package standalone w32 apps as single executable files using the AppImage format (maybe automated using https://github.com/PhoenicisOrg/scripts) reusing much of the same work.

Proof-of-concept:

• https://github.com/probonopd/libhookexecv/releases/tag/continuous

@qparis here:

Phoenicis wine build could automatically build any version to an app image format. What do we need to know to create a wine app image from a source root?

Looking at https://github.com/Hackerl/Wine_Appimage/blob/master/deployscript/debian-winedeploy.sh, it is actually quite easy - the existing wine builds can be reused, and an AppImage can be made by just executing a few extra steps:

1. Add libhookexecv.so and wine-preloader_hook here
2. Add all dependencies of wine (in this example, using debian) here
3. Turn the directory into an AppImage using appimagetool here

[probonopd]

In case you wonder what libhookexecv.so and wine-preloader_hook are all about, it is explained in detail at

• https://www.winehq.org/pipermail/wine-devel/2017-November/119906.html
• https://www.winehq.org/pipermail/wine-devel/2017-November/119944.html

Instead of getting a patch into wine upstream, @Hackerl made a solution using LD_PRELOAD: Hackerl/Wine_Appimage#11.

If you think it would be cleaner, it might still be worthwhile to get the solution into wine upstream proper. Since @qparis is a well-known wine community member, I guess that with your support it could be achieved.

[qparis]

Ok ! It seems quite easy. In fact, if we start from the .tar.gz generated by winebuild, the 2) is already done.

I suggest we start with wine-preloader_hook to see if it works before implementing some patches.

Simple question: can the appimagetool run inside a docker container?

[probonopd]

Yes. It comes as an AppImage itself which means it needs FUSE. For security reasons, FUSE is usually disabled in Docker containers, so you can use --appimage-extract or --appimage-extract-and-run as described at https://github.com/AppImage/AppImageKit/wiki/FUSE#docker:

wget -c https://github.com/AppImage/AppImageKit/releases/download/continuous/appimagetool-x86_64.AppImage
chmod +x appimagetool-x86_64.AppImage
./appimagetool-x86_64.AppImage --appimage-extract-and-run <other command line arguments>