feat(release): publish Linux .deb and .rpm alongside the AppImage

[chukfinley]

Closes #298.

One open question

Maintainer: is a mandatory Debian control field, so the deb target needs an address. I used hello@t3.tools as a placeholder — I have no way to know which mailbox you want on it, and I did not want to quietly invent one that bounces. Tell me the right address and I'll amend; it is a single string.

Why this is smaller than you'd expect

--target deb already works. createBuildConfig passes the target straight through to electron-builder, and the artifact copy step is target-agnostic. Nothing in the pipeline needs restructuring.

A deb build fails today for exactly one reason: app-builder-lib's FpmTarget requires two metadata fields the staged package.json omits. AppImage needs neither, so nothing ever surfaced it:

// app-builder-lib/out/targets/FpmTarget.js
if (projectUrl == null) {
  errors.push("Please specify project homepage, ...")
}
let author = options.maintainer
if (author == null) {
  const a = packager.info.metadata.author
  if (a == null || a.email == null) {
    errors.push(errorMessages.authorEmailIsMissed)   // author is "T3 Tools", no email
  } else {
    author = `${a.name} <${a.email}>`
  }
}
if (errors.length > 0) throw new Error(errors.join("\n\n"))

Add homepage, add maintainer. That is the feature.

The artifact-name collision

#1655 was closed partly because "the artifact-name collision remains unresolved". That collision is a consequence of adding a second Linux matrix entry: the upload step names artifacts desktop-${{ matrix.platform }}-${{ matrix.arch }}, so a linux/deb/x64 entry produces desktop-linux-x64 — the same name the AppImage entry already uses. upload-artifact then fails.

This PR adds no matrix entry. The existing Linux entry builds both targets in one electron-builder run (target: AppImage,deb), so there is one artifact name, one runner, and no collision by construction. The output files don't collide either — artifactName's ${ext} already separates .AppImage from .deb.

Side effect: no extra runner and no second full desktop build, so release wall-clock is unchanged.

rpm

.rpm ships from the same job. It needs no code beyond what the deb target already required — same FpmTarget, same homepage/maintainer, and the rpm dependency list sits next to the deb one — so the Linux job builds AppImage,deb,rpm in one electron-builder run and *.rpm joins *.deb in the collect step and both upload lists.

electron-builder shells out to rpmbuild for this. The Ubuntu 24.04 runner image ships it in the rpm package (4.18.2), so the added step is a no-op there; it installs the package only if the binary is missing, so the target survives an image change.

Changes

File	Change
scripts/build-desktop-artifact.ts	Add homepage + maintainer; split target on commas so one Linux run can emit several targets; declare Electron's shared-library depends per package format (deb and rpm).
scripts/build-desktop-artifact.test.ts	Cover the comma split, the maintainer format, and that deb/rpm sections only appear for the formats actually built.
.github/workflows/release.yml	Linux matrix builds AppImage,deb,rpm; add *.deb and *.rpm to the collect step and to both release upload lists; ensure rpmbuild is present.
package.json	dist:desktop:deb and dist:desktop:rpm, each with :arm64/:x64 variants, matching the existing dist:desktop:dmg/:win families (bare script uses host arch).
docs/internals/scripts.md, docs/operations/release.md	Document the new scripts, the comma-separated target, and that the .deb is not an updater payload.
apps/marketing/src/pages/download.astro	.deb card on the download page (amd64.deb asset suffix).

Note the two softprops/action-gh-release blocks (first-release and subsequent-release) each carry their own file list — both needed *.deb, otherwise the package builds and never ships.

Verification

Built on Ubuntu 24.04, x64, from this branch:

$ vp run dist:desktop:artifact --platform linux --target AppImage,deb --arch x64 \
    --build-version 0.0.29-nightly.20260716.825

[desktop-artifact] Done. Artifacts:
  T3-Code-0.0.29-nightly.20260716.825-amd64.deb          (194 MB)
  T3-Code-0.0.29-nightly.20260716.825-x86_64.AppImage    (256 MB)

$ dpkg -I T3-Code-0.0.29-nightly.20260716.825-amd64.deb
 Package: t3code
 Version: 0.0.29~nightly.20260716.825
 Architecture: amd64
 Maintainer: T3 Tools <hello@t3.tools>
 Installed-Size: 757008
 Depends: libgtk-3-0, libnotify4, libnss3, libxss1, libxtst6, xdg-utils,
          libatspi2.0-0, libuuid1, libsecret-1-0
 Recommends: libappindicator3-1
 Homepage: https://github.com/pingdotgg/t3code
 Description: T3 Code desktop build

dpkg -c shows the executable at /opt/T3 Code*/t3code and the .desktop entry at /usr/share/applications/t3code.desktop. Installs and launches via sudo apt install ./T3-Code-*-amd64.deb.

Consolidation with the other .deb PRs

There were four overlapping PRs for this (#4071, #4887, #4900, #5139). Per the discussion in #5139 this one now folds in the parts that were missing here, so there is a single PR to review:

• runtime depends lists for deb and rpm, and the rpm target, from @bigpod98's feat(packaging): add deb and rpm desktop targets #5139
• docs updates and the download-page card from @benthecarman's feat(desktop): Add a Linux .deb to releases #4900
• the release-workflow wiring and the single-run, no-collision approach from this PR

Credit to them for those pieces; happy to consolidate the other way round instead if a maintainer prefers one of the other PRs as the base — the point is one PR, not this PR.

Not included, deliberately:

• No headless /usr/bin/t3 launcher. feat(packaging): add deb and rpm desktop targets #5139 has one; it is an entrypoint change rather than packaging metadata — it changes what lands on users' PATH — so it deserves its own review. @bigpod98 agreed to split it out.
• No arm64. Linux arm64 is absent from the release matrix entirely today, AppImage included. The build script already handles it (dist:desktop:deb:arm64, dist:desktop:rpm:arm64 build locally), but shipping it needs a second matrix entry on an arm64 runner — a cost decision only a maintainer can make. Follow-up PR, happy to write it.

Verification of this revision

• rebased onto current main, no conflicts
• vitest run scripts/build-desktop-artifact.test.ts — 32 passed
• vp lint on the touched scripts — clean; astro check on apps/marketing — 0 errors

---

Note

Medium Risk
Changes the release artifact matrix and GitHub Release file matching (fail_on_unmatched_files), so a failed rpm/deb build blocks shipping; packaging metadata uses a placeholder maintainer email pending confirmation.

Overview
Linux desktop releases now emit AppImage, .deb, and .rpm from the existing single Linux matrix job by passing a comma-separated AppImage,deb,rpm target—avoiding a second runner and duplicate artifact names.

The desktop packager gains resolveLinuxTargets, staged homepage / maintainer metadata required by electron-builder’s deb/rpm targets, and per-format depends lists; CI installs rpmbuild when needed and attaches *.deb / *.rpm to GitHub Releases. Local dist:desktop:deb / rpm scripts, docs, tests, and a marketing .deb download card follow the same packaging story.

Linux in-app auto-update stays AppImage-only; deb/rpm installs are expected to upgrade via the system package manager.

^{Reviewed by Cursor Bugbot for commit 6815958. Bugbot is set up for automated code reviews on this repo. Configure here.}

Note

Publish Linux .deb and .rpm packages alongside AppImage in releases

• The release workflow now builds AppImage,deb,rpm in a single Linux x64 run, installs rpmbuild on the runner when needed, and uploads .deb/.rpm files as release assets alongside the AppImage.
• scripts/build-desktop-artifact.ts gains resolveLinuxTargets to parse comma-separated target strings, and conditionally injects deb.depends/rpm.depends, maintainer, homepage, and other metadata into the Tauri build config.
• New dist:desktop:deb and dist:desktop:rpm npm scripts (including arm64/x64 variants) allow local builds of each format.
• The marketing downloads page adds a .deb download card for Debian/Ubuntu (x86_64).
• Behavioral Change: Linux in-app auto-updates remain AppImage-only; .deb and .rpm are shipped in the release but are not updater payloads.

^{Macroscope summarized 6815958.}

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Approvability

Verdict: Needs human review

This PR introduces new Linux distribution formats (.deb and .rpm) that will be published to end users, modifying the release workflow significantly. Changes to release infrastructure and new user-facing artifacts warrant human review.

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[LouisDeconinck]

Can this get merged?

Dismissing prior approval to re-evaluate ce3ca8d

[chukfinley]

@LouisDeconinck sorry for the slow reply. It had gone stale and conflicting against main, which alone would have blocked a merge. That's fixed now:

• rebased onto current main — MERGEABLE, checks green
• folded in the parts that only existed in the other .deb PRs, so this is reviewable as one change: deb/rpm depends from feat(packaging): add deb and rpm desktop targets #5139 (credit @bigpod98), docs + download-page card from feat(desktop): Add a Linux .deb to releases #4900 (credit @benthecarman)
• added unit tests over the target split, the maintainer format, and the per-format depends

There are four overlapping PRs for this (#4071, #4887, #4900, #5139) and a consolidation discussion is running in #5139 — that's the place to push, and I've said there that I'm fine with any of them being the base as long as it's one PR. Whatever lands, the release-workflow wiring in this PR (single Linux run emitting AppImage,deb, plus *.deb in the collect step and in both action-gh-release file lists) is the piece that has to come along, or the package builds and never ships.