Discussion: How do you distribute your applications?

[Wesbat]

Hello there. I am thinking about all the ways how to distribute my FPC-developed application. Windows is easy: an InnoSetup installer suffices nicely. Linux is a little trickier. FYI: I used this wiki page as my starting point.

My first attempt was an AppImage package. I wanted a solution independent of a third-party framework, while containerizing any dependencies (in my case, libsqlite) for a truly stand-alone experience (needless to say I did not succeed).

Moving on, I saw recommendations on these forums for 0Install. The process seems a bit daunting, and before I fall down that rabbit hole ...

I'd like to open a discussion to hear how you approach distributing your apps to end users. What is your preferred method to distribute for GNU / Linux? Do you opt for binary releases, or do you prefer to go the Makefile route and let the end users battle it out with the compiler?

Looking forward to your thoughts 

[Thaddy]

(in my case, libsqlite) for a truly stand-alone experience (needless to say I did not succeed).

Why? You can link SQLite statically. So then your executable does not have any dependencies.

[TRon]

What is your preferred method to distribute for GNU / Linux? Do you opt for binary releases, or do you prefer to go the Makefile route and let the end users battle it out with the compiler?

The way that the distribution prefer users to to distribute applications.

Thus explicitly not introducing other operating system methods to install applications.

[marcov]

Do you opt for binary releases, or do you prefer to go the Makefile route and let the end users battle it out with the compiler?

Usually we also deliver hardware with an OS. Then we provide binary updates for that distro.  If we don't deliver the distro, we don't deliver binaries.

Though admitted, our Linux releasing is rather limited. Mostly simple TCP/IP based applications that bridge between main embedded binaries on Windows and a company network.

For windows we deliver binary (standlone binaries for preinstalled machines, though the software requirements are rather limited)