[Feature request] Linux version?

[robaca]

Hi,

I really would love to see Fork running on Linux. Are there any plans for this?

Best regards,
Carsten

[DanPristupov]

@robaca Hi. I've never developed for Linux and don't even know what languages and libraries people use to implement GUI applications in Linux. So I think this will not happen in the visible future.

[clounie]

An Electron app could be an option. Apps like Slack, Atom, and MongoDB Compass are built with it.

That'd also get you Windows as a bonus.

I'd also love to see this - macOS at work, but Linux/Windows at home.

[nebhale]

One of the reasons that I love Fork over all of the other options in this space is that it’s a native macOS application. Electron is a reasonable choice for cross-platform applications, but there is no question when I use applications based on it, that they are not nearly as well integrated into any operating system as applications built specifically for that operating system. It seems that so far that @DanPristupov has had the goal of making the best Git GUI client on macOS and his focus on a single operating system has enabled him to do that without compromise.

[clounie]

To be clear, I'm not at all saying the macOS app should be converted to Electron.

I don't disagree - but would rather have an app for Linux than not have one (which is, I assume, what non-Electron equates to, at least for a long while)

Windows is already on the horizon (per the website,) and something like Electron is something that would need discussion before work is started on that. Hence my first comment - better to bring it up than to regret not doing it later.

[clounie]

Ended up switching to Linux at work, ironically - didn't know until a week ago.

Hope Fork does well.

[DanPristupov]

@clounie ouch, it's a big loss :(. You've been helping making Fork better from the day one (the initial post on HN).

I appreciate your help. Thank you very much ❤️.

[clounie]

If there's anything I could do to help save Linux computers from GitKraken, let me know ;)

[maksimovic]

Slightly offtopic - I've tried GitKraken on Mac and it was literally unusable with our repository (it's huge). No person in the world could get used to waiting for 3-5s at least for every click. I also find Slack making my Mac going into airplane engine mode from time to time (being logged to multiple workspaces greatly "helps" in achieving that). So... I don't know, Electron may be okay sometimes, but for apps that should handle heavy lifting I don't think it's a good solution.

[clounie]

^ yep, agreed. The performance diff b/w Fork and GitKraken is pretty huge even on small repos.

[TheMrAnderson]

I would love Fork on Linux. I'm using GitKraken at the moment

[coaperator]

I support!
I'm trying to leave Windows for Debian
Tired of endless glitches from Microsoft
We look forward to fork under Linux
Linux ❤️ Fork

[DanPristupov]

I'd not expect Fork on Linux until a decent UI dev environment appears there.

Avalonia looks very promising, but it must become mature.

[coaperator]

I'd not expect Fork on Linux until a decent UI dev environment appears there.

Avalonia looks very promising, but it must become mature.

Yes, it looks pretty ..
But it is developing very slowly

[coaperator]

Well that's all, I switched from Windows to Debian ..
I really look forward to Fork under Linux, because, except for SmartGit, then there are simply no normal, adequate clients under Linux ..

[clounie]

I'd not expect Fork on Linux until a decent UI dev environment appears there.

Avalonia looks very promising, but it must become mature.

QT?

[astrolemonade]

I would really love to see Fork available on Linux. It can be made to be built from source or you can distribute AppImages or snaps or flatpacks for cross distributions so you would not have to work with different package managers.
It could be made in Gtk/Qt/React Native/Flutter/wxWidgets.
I hope the best for Fork and I hope that it will come to Linux at some point !
Edit: Do not close this issue and do not make the same mistake Atlassian is doing, to ignore the Linux community. It is bigger than the Windows one in terms of how many people know to code!

Edit2: If you are wondering what Qt is capable of just look at Qbittorrent:https://github.com/qbittorrent/qBittorrent
It uses Qt/C++ and a library named libtorrent. Also Qt is cross platform and easy to write software with! There is a lot of information about it and there is also an implementation for Python if you are interested in the language.

[DanPristupov]

If you are wondering what Qt is capable of just look at Qbittorrent:https://github.com/qbittorrent/qBittorrent

This is kind of the reason, why I'd like to stay with the native libraries :)

[astrolemonade]

I don't quite understand what are you saying ! Do you like it or not ? If not, what are your reasons? (I would like to hear them for future projects)
Gtk is the native for most of the linux distros out there

[TheMrAnderson]

I'm not sure what Fork is written in now, but Python with a front end like PyQT, Tkinter or WxPython looks promising, plus it's all cross platform. I'm sure there are enough devs who would love to help in any way they could.

[neonb]

This is kind of the reason, why I'd like to stay with the native libraries :)

For KDE and LXQt distros Qt is the native library (e.g. Kubuntu, openSUSE, Lubuntu). A lot of Linux installations run some KDE/Qt software, regardless of desktop environment. They don't necessarily look like an outdated torrent client either – in fact, since a couple years back, the Plasma desktop environment is IMO among the best looking ones on the market.

If you'd like to go with the toolkit that's the closest to native to the largest portion of Linux userbase, it's GTK. (Avalonia bundles GTK, if you prefer to use it.) Qt and GTK both have pseudo-themes that look like each other, which both just delegate rendering to the underlying native toolkit. And I would describe both, especially Qt, a "decent" and "mature" UI dev environment. They've both got IDEs, XAML-style UI serialization, and 20+ years under the belt.

Tk and wx toolkits mentioned above are quite old, but can also leverage the DE's native toolkit with... varying success. All these should have licenses compatible with proprietary software, and bindings to any language you can think of.

[clounie]

^^ thank you for saying it better than I could have :)

[tflo]

I have nothing against a Linux version but please, @DanPristupov, keep the native Mac version. If you throw a Qt or Electron app at me, I’m out.

[joostoudeman]

Now, I'm not currently in a position to test. But wouldn't it be possible to run the windows version on linux using https://www.mono-project.com/? The windows version is based on .NET is it not?

[nartc]

@clounie (and any Linux users) have you looked at Sublime Merge? It's not Electron sh*t. and @DanPristupov I love Fork at the moment. I'm switching from Sublime Merge to Fork for maybe a sprint to see how it goes.

[clounie]

Hah you won't regret ;)

Just downloaded - interesting, will try using that instead of Kraken for a bit and see how it goes. Thanks 👍

[Ansraer]

I am using Fork on a Win PC I have at home, but have Linux on my laptop and work pc. I would really love a port, have to use gitKraken right now and it sucks.
I know that this would be a massive undertaking, but based on what I have heard about net core and Avalon it should at least be possible without rewriting everything.

If Linux support is ever considered know that I am willing to help in any way I can.

[MisterJD]

Yes a additional Linux version would be fantastic. 👍

[dmansurov83]

@DanPristupov Hello! Which stack you are using for the app? Is it related to .net?

[andgeno]

@julaudo Can you share the installation steps you used? When I tried it I got blocked by this issue (bottlesdevs/Bottles#202)

Actually I did not run the installation exe (because of the bug you mentionned). Instead of that I followed this steps:

• Download Fork-1.91.2.exe for fork website
• Extract files contained in Fork-1.91.2.exe
• One of those files is named Fork-1.91.2-full.nupkg, extract it
• Fork executable is located at Fork-1.91.2-full/lib/net45/Fork.exe

I just had to install dotnet462 (using winetricks) and it ran fine.

I ran winetricks dotnet462. Then, I tried to launch Fork with wine ./lib/net45/Fork.exe and end up with this dialog.

What am I doing wrong/differently?

Clicking on yes should do the job

Sorry, I wasn't clear about what would happen after clicking the 'yes' button.

Unfortunately, it doesn't run Fork but opens a browser with this URL:

https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/download/dotnet-framework/net481?cid=getdotnetframework

There is no other error message.

I'm using Ubuntu 22.04 LTS, fresh install.

EDIT:

Actually, there are errors when I run winetricks dotnet462 that might be the issue here:

------------------------------------------------------
warning: You are using a 64-bit WINEPREFIX. Note that many verbs only install 32-bit versions of packages. If you encounter problems, please retest in a clean 32-bit WINEPREFIX before reporting a bug.
------------------------------------------------------
Executing load_dotnet45 
------------------------------------------------------
warning: This package (dotnet45) is broken in wine-6.0.3. Broken since 5.18. See https://bugs.winehq.org/show_bug.cgi?id=49897 for more info. Use --force to try anyway.
------------------------------------------------------

So, I guess my installation of Wine or Winetricks is too old?

[Baardi]

@julaudo Can you share the installation steps you used? When I tried it I got blocked by this issue (bottlesdevs/Bottles#202)

Actually I did not run the installation exe (because of the bug you mentionned). Instead of that I followed this steps:

• Download Fork-1.91.2.exe for fork website
• Extract files contained in Fork-1.91.2.exe
• One of those files is named Fork-1.91.2-full.nupkg, extract it
• Fork executable is located at Fork-1.91.2-full/lib/net45/Fork.exe

I just had to install dotnet462 (using winetricks) and it ran fine.

I ran winetricks dotnet462. Then, I tried to launch Fork with wine ./lib/net45/Fork.exe and end up with this dialog.

What am I doing wrong/differently?

Clicking on yes should do the job

I didn't get the same problem. I was able to install .NET Framework 4.6.2 without a problem. But as I attempt to actually start Fork it immediately crashes, on Fedora 39. Using the same install method as you @julaudo. I can send the crashlogs, if it is of any interest to @DanPristupov

[DanPristupov]

@Baardi send them to support@fork.dev

[Baardi]

@Baardi send them to support@fork.dev

Thanks for the help. He was able to figure out what was wrong in my case:

At first I wasn't able to launch due to missing fonts.

• I ran "sh winetricks corefonts" which solved that issue.

Now I could get to the welcome screen. But I immediately got the following error afterwards;

• This time, the problem was that I had unzipped Fork to the wrong location. The content of lib/net45 has to be unzipped to %localappdata%/Fork/app-%version%
  The content of gitInstance should go to %localappdata%/Fork/gitInstance. Then it worked for me.

[DanPristupov]

@Baardi so, does it really work on Linux? 👀

May be we can create a tutorial (or even an .sh script) which would install Fork.

[zrpfpr]

Great work @Baardi!
In that case, you need windows version for external Diff/Merge tools also, right? Or you can bypass at some point and use your Linux programs?

[Baardi]

I think I was a bit too optimistic. The initial results seemed good.
I was able to open a local git repository, see file changes, etc, but when I dragged it into a different monitor, other than the main one, it immediately froze. It would also launch next time in the same broken state. The only way I found to fix it was to delete the settings.json file.

Next I tried creating a new branch. sh.exe crashed. But the branch was succesfully created.

I then tried commit a change to that branch. That worked fine, no errors.
I then tried pushing the changes. It didn't work, as libcurl-4.dll was missing.

So it's safe to say I have a few issues to sort out.

EDIT: So I don't spam you all. The dll load failure was due to a missing dll in system32/syswow64: Wldap32.dll. I copied the dlls from my windows 11 installation, which seemed to work.
Authentication is still a problem though, at least for github (Neither https or ssh worked for me).

[Baardi]

I think I probably just got as far as @gbtb and @NitroHxC. Curious whether or not you got further than that @julaudo

[DanPristupov]

To discuss running Fork with Wine I created a separated issue : #2033

[theburntcrumpet]

I just wanted to drop a comment and say that Fork on Linux is definitely something there's some demand for. I've yet to find a git UI on linux as clean as fork which handles hooks/git-lfs properly and would love to see it natively supported - I'd happily buy another license just for linux. Really appreciate fork, keep up the good work.

[lucastucious]

I'm here just for saying that fork is my best friend. But I'm moving to linux. I hope I will see my friend one day

[daltonbr]

I want to express my support here - I am moving out from GitKraken - which served me well, but I grew tired of the slowness of an Electron app and the subscription model - the native approach of Fork got me.

I use all Mac/Windows/Linux and I would love to see a native Linux release - would gladly pay a bit more for that privilege. 🐧

[mateusz-spychala]

I agree. We need good GIT client for linux

[safield]

I wonder if a reasonable option would be to just have an officially supported flatpak that bundles the windows version with wine and anything else needed to run. This way the devs could couple the windows version with a tested and known working version of wine and its wine configuration. I imagine through this technique you could probably provide a reliable experience.

[Feyko]

Fork is so good I'm making everyone at work switch to it instead of SourceTree but I sadly can't use it myself as I work on Linux 😔 Please consider supporting linux!

[limbusdev]

I wonder if a reasonable option would be to just have an officially supported flatpak that bundles the windows version with wine and anything else needed to run. This way the devs could couple the windows version with a tested and known working version of wine and its wine configuration. I imagine through this technique you could probably provide a reliable experience.

But you would want to use a native git. Not one running through wine.

[safield]

I wonder if a reasonable option would be to just have an officially supported flatpak that bundles the windows version with wine and anything else needed to run. This way the devs could couple the windows version with a tested and known working version of wine and its wine configuration. I imagine through this technique you could probably provide a reliable experience.

But you would want to use a native git. Not one running through wine.

Not necessarily. You would probably bundle git in the flatpak. That is the idealogy of flatpak....you bundle your dependencies. This is exactly how bundling in flatpak with a snapshot of all the dependencies (including wine) you can provide a reliable and stable experience.

[sharpjs]

Fork is so good on my Windows workstation that it makes me reconsider running Linux on a new laptop I got. Yes, gitg is similar, but it is far from a complete substitute for Fork. Fork's feature set and UX is just in a different league.

I've already converted one coworker to Fork, and a second one is just about there.

[ZoserLock]

I hope a version for linux arrive some day. I would gladly pay for that version again even if I already have the windows version.

[CzB404]

[dtap001]

please make my dream came true and migrate git-fork to linux!! <3

[GreatNovaDragon]

Best thing for fork would be to be open source
Second best thing would be to just release it on linux

[safield]

Best thing for fork would be to be open source Second best thing would be to just release it on linux

What?! Why??? The two developers have created an amazing product and a nice little business for themselves, and you want them to open source it?!? I vehemently disagree.

[GreatNovaDragon]

Open Sourcing an app doesnt exclude Monetisation.

aseprite/asesprite would be a prime example of an paid open-source app, where you could either buy the built product.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux would also be another example.

There's also still several donation options. Sometimes you can even get a grant via that.

[BrodyB]

Want to also say it would be amazing to see Fork in the Linux ecosystem. I'm migrating myself over to Pop!_OS because (nervously looks at tech company trends) and this is the one big thing I'm missing.

The landscape of git clients on Linux is surprisingly bad! All the available ones are underbaked or unreliable. There is definitely a real need for a quality application that is not being met.

[ZaLiTHkA]

The landscape of git clients on Linux is surprisingly bad! All the available ones are underbaked or unreliable. There is definitely a real need for a quality application that is not being met.

this is scarily true.. I recently moved my dev environment to Zorin OS, I've spent many hours over the past week trying to find a Git GUI that "just works". the biggest issue for me, is that virtually none of them support showing diffs between two selected commits.

in the meantime, I've switched over to Sublime Merge. if that had a perpetual license option, I would have made the move permanent already, but I'm holding off for a while to see what happens with Fork first. it would really suck having to pay $99 (currently about R1800 in my local currency) every 3 years just to get realiable access to basic Git features in a GUI.

[VirtualOverrider]

+1 for native Linux support!
Fork could very easily eat the subscription options' lunch if only it were available. <3

[HermesSantos]

Please, I need it!

[tobysroof]

I've left windows and Fork is what I miss the most. It would be amazing to get support for Linux