Flatpak support

[reesericci]

I was wondering if the HTTPie project would consider supporting Flatpak as the packaging solution for Linux. It has slowly been taking over as the main universal packaging format for Linux. One of the big advantages over your current solution, AppImage, is that there is no need for a helper package like AppImageLauncher to properly integrate into a system. The other main advantage is that HTTPie can be distributed & discovered through a main app center, Flathub. Flathub is available from a variety of sources, including their website as well as native application stores like GNOME Software & Elementary OS' AppCenter.

Thanks for considering this proposal!

--reese

[claudiatd]

@reesericci thank you for your suggestion! Alternatives to AppImage is something we'll definitely look for at some point

[YAMLcase]

Where I work we have a mix of linux and Mac workstations/laptops. Homebrew seems to be the one package manager people are happiest with.

[jkbrzt]

@YAMLcase thanks for the feedback — Homebrew casks are coming soon!

[reesericci]

Homebrew is not well supported on Linux. Nobody uses it.

[YAMLcase]

Homebrew is not well supported on Linux. Nobody uses it.

Source?

[reesericci]

Find a source for a major linux distro shipping with homebrew out of the box.

[lakano]

I'm also interested per a Flatpak package. Some major GNU/Linux distributions proposes immutable flavor or their OS ( Fedora Silverblue, OpenSuse MicroOS, ChromeOS, EndlessOS, VanillaOS ... ) and the philosophy is to not permit to touch the host system (generally auto-updated w/ rollback if failures), then the user choice is mostly (and sometime exclusively) relayed to Flatpak for security reasons and portability (it's not totally the case of AppImage).
Thank you!

[asjur]

Homebrew is not well supported on Linux. Nobody uses it.

Source?

Do you really need a source? Nobody ships it. Nobody talks about it. Nobody supports it.
Homebrew is for macOS, and while homebrew exists on Linux it's like running nix on macOS, while possible it does not see widespread support in the community.

Flatpak however has multiple advantages, it would be dumb to not leverage them. There are a few issues with the AppImage they ship today.

1. It cannot be used on distributions using alternatives to glibc such as musl (see AlpineLinux, VoidLinux etc)
2. Iffy support for pinning applications in desktop environments and cooperation with existing software.
   Example:
   Launching HTTPie, right clicking and pinning to task bar doesn't work. If I close the application and click it again it will error because the mount doesn't exist (as intended).
   AppImages don't play nice with firewalls, for instance opensnitch, I need to approve requests every single time I launch any AppImage because the binary and its mount changes every time the application opens, not the biggest deal in the world but big enough for it to be considered a nuisance and if I don't notice it the approval will timeout and result in all requests from the application to be denied.

[TheComputerM]

Yeah, a flatpak would be nice.

[joematthews]

I've been using httpie at work for awhile and love it (Mac OS).

At home I use Fedora Linux and I install the Flatpak version of most apps for ease of maintenance and a bit more security.

Both Insomnia & Postman have official versions uploaded to https://flathub.org/

Speaking for myself (and maybe others), software adoption on Linux in 2023 depends heavily on Flatpak availability.

Please reconsider this request. Thank you.

[AdsonCicilioti]

Homebrew is not popular on Linux.

+1 Flatpak

[flexagoon]

I'm using Homebrew on Fedora Silverblue as my main package manager. However, that doesn't matter, because Brew Casks are only supported on macOS.

[flexagoon]

I have packaged httpie as a Flatpak and submitted a PR for it to be added to Flathub:

flathub/flathub#4819

If the httpie maintainers would like to take ownership of the flatpak and make it official, I'd be glad to do that

[reesericci]

That's great to hear! I'll leave this issue open until HTTPie decides if they will take ownership or not.

[flexagoon]

HTTPie is now on Flathub!

https://flathub.org/apps/io.httpie.Httpie

[driverkt]

Can we have aarch64 too?

HTTPie is now on Flathub!

https://flathub.org/apps/io.httpie.Httpie

[flexagoon]

@driverkt done! The aarch64 version is now on Flathub as well.