Fix-path breaks quit from dock in packaged electron app on OSX

[nlawrence22]

When using Fix-path with Electron and electron-packager, it breaks the ability for the user to quit the application from the dock after packaging. Right clicking the doc-icon and selecting "Quit" does nothing.

This is explained in better detail here: electron/electron#8687 . For a minimal application reproducing the problem, see electron/electron#8687 (comment)

[nlawrence22]

For reference, the hotkey ⌘Q does work, as does Force Quitting the app.

[silverwind]

Maybe a stuck child process? Try https://github.com/sindresorhus/shell-env and check if the promise it returns resolves. Also check with pstree or similar tools if your app has child processes.

[nlawrence22]

My understanding was that any electron app will have at least 1 child process, since there's the main process and the render process, correct? My app doesn't have child processes other than the 2 render processes typical of electron, similar to:

nlawrence-6148:~ nlawrence$ pstree -w -p 40093
-+= 00001 root /sbin/launchd
 \-+= 38205 nlawrence /Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app/Contents/MacOS/Terminal
   \-+= 39944 root login -pf nlawrence
     \-+= 39945 nlawrence -bash
       \-+= 40093 nlawrence /Users/nlawrence/projects/testFixPath/testfixpath-darwin-x64/testfixpath.app/Contents/MacOS/testfixpath
         |--- 40094 nlawrence /Users/nlawrence/projects/testFixPath/testfixpath-darwin-x64/testfixpath.app/Contents/Frameworks/testfixpath Helper.app/Contents/MacOS/testfixpath Helper --type=gpu-process --no-sandbox --supports-dual-gpus=true --gpu-driver-bug-workarounds=0,1,10,23,25,36,39,40,47,53,61,63,64,65,66,68,73,74,76,84,85,86,89,92 --disable-gl-extensions=GL_KHR_blend_equation_advanced GL_KHR_blend_equation_advanced_coherent --gpu-vendor-id=0x1002 --gpu-device-id=0x67ef --gpu-driver-vendor --gpu-driver-version --gpu-driver-date --gpu-secondary-vendor-ids=0x8086 --gpu-secondary-device-ids=0x191b --gpu-active-vendor-id=0x8086 --gpu-active-device-id=0x191b --service-request-channel-token=F8B8D03B2B7DA14AE3390044FDC57087
         \--- 40095 nlawrence /Users/nlawrence/projects/testFixPath/testfixpath-darwin-x64/testfixpath.app/Contents/Frameworks/testfixpath Helper.app/Contents/MacOS/testfixpath Helper --type=renderer --no-sandbox --primordial-pipe-token=D2743DBC268ADC46AF52275F4A4A7AB9 --lang=en-US --app-path=/Users/nlawrence/projects/testFixPath/testfixpath-darwin-x64/testfixpath.app/Contents/Resources/app --node-integration=true --webview-tag=true --no-sandbox --enable-pinch --num-raster-threads=4 --enable-zero-copy --enable-gpu-memory-buffer-compositor-resources --enable-main-frame-before-activation --content-image-texture-target=0,0,3553;0,1,3553;0,2,3553;0,3,3553;0,4,3553;0,5,3553;0,6,3553;0,7,3553;0,8,3553;0,9,3553;0,10,34037;0,11,34037;0,12,34037;0,13,3553;0,14,3553;0,15,3553;1,0,3553;1,1,3553;1,2,3553;1,3,3553;1,4,3553;1,5,3553;1,6,3553;1,7,3553;1,8,3553;1,9,3553;1,10,34037;1,11,34037;1,12,34037;1,13,3553;1,14,3553;1,15,3553;2,0,3553;2,1,3553;2,2,3553;2,3,3553;2,4,3553;2,5,3553;2,6,3553;2,7,3553;2,8,3553;2,9,3553;2,10,34037;2,11,34037;2,12,34037;2,13,3553;2,14,3553;2,15,3553;3,0,3553;3,1,3553;3,2,3553;3,3,3553;3,4,3553;3,5,34037;3,6,3553;3,7,3553;3,8,3553;3,9,3553;3,10,3553;3,11,3553;3,12,34037;3,13,3553;3,14,34037;3,15,34037;4,0,3553;4,1,3553;4,2,3553;4,3,3553;4,4,3553;4,5,34037;4,6,3553;4,7,3553;4,8,3553;4,9,3553;4,10,3553;4,11,3553;4,12,34037;4,13,3553;4,14,34037;4,15,34037 --service-request-channel-token=D2743DBC268ADC46AF52275F4A4A7AB9 --renderer-client-id=4

That being said, I've run through @wuww5511 's steps from the linked issue, and I'm not able to reproduce with their minimal app, so there's probably a piece missing. It's definitely still happening in my app (and if I comment out the include of fix-path, quitting works as expected). I'll do a bit more digging and see if I can come up with a set of reproducible steps.

[nlawrence22]

I spoke too soon -- I can now reliably reproduce this.

Apparently there's a difference in the way that the app is executed if you double-click [Your Electron App].app or if you navigate inside the app-bundle and run the shell script there ([Your Electron App].app > Contents > MacOS > [Your Electron App]) -- the former breaks quit, the latter does not, even when using the same app bundle that requires fix-path. I was previously using the latter, which is why I wasn't able to reproduce.

Here are the steps to reproduce (on a mac):

1. git clone https://github.com/electron/electron-quick-start exampleApp
2. cd exampleApp
3. yarn add fix-path
4. yarn add electron-packager --dev
5. Add require('fix-path')(); to the top of main.js (I also tried after the require of electron or of path -- didn't seem to matter where in the file it was)
6. Add the following script definition in package.json "package": "electron-packager . test --overwrite"
7. yarn run package
8. Navigate to exampleApp/test-darwin-x64/ in finder
9. Double-click test.app
10. Right-click the dock and select Quit

Note that if you instead navigate to exampleApp/test-darwin-x64/test.app/Contents/MacOS/ and double click test then you can quit as expected.

Here's a git patch showing all of the changes on top of the base electron-quick-start repo required to repro this:

diff --git a/main.js b/main.js
index 07561fa..0f450b3 100644
--- a/main.js
+++ b/main.js
@@ -1,3 +1,4 @@
+require('fix-path')();
 const electron = require('electron')
 // Module to control application life.
 const app = electron.app
diff --git a/package.json b/package.json
index 4386fec..8670a28 100644
--- a/package.json
+++ b/package.json
@@ -4,7 +4,8 @@
   "description": "A minimal Electron application",
   "main": "main.js",
   "scripts": {
-    "start": "electron ."
+    "start": "electron .",
+    "package": "electron-packager . test --overwrite"
   },
   "repository": "https://github.com/electron/electron-quick-start",
   "keywords": [
@@ -17,6 +18,10 @@
   "author": "GitHub",
   "license": "CC0-1.0",
   "devDependencies": {
-    "electron": "~1.7.8"
+    "electron": "~1.7.8",
+    "electron-packager": "^11.0.1"
+  },
+  "dependencies": {
-    "start": "electron ."
+    "start": "electron .",
+    "package": "electron-packager . test --overwrite"
   },
   "repository": "https://github.com/electron/electron-quick-start",
   "keywords": [
@@ -17,6 +18,10 @@
   "author": "GitHub",
   "license": "CC0-1.0",
   "devDependencies": {
-    "electron": "~1.7.8"
+    "electron": "~1.7.8",
+    "electron-packager": "^11.0.1"
+  },
+  "dependencies": {
+    "fix-path": "^2.1.0"
   }
 }

I'll spend a little time looking into shell-env next, but you should be able to reproduce this at will with these steps.

As a side note, I'm willing to accept this could be an issue with how electron-packager is bundling things, or with electron itself, but I'd ask for your help filing an issue against those projects if that's determined to be the cause, since electron has already closed this issue once as "due to an issue in a 3rd party module".