Arch Linux User Repository

If you have troubles, read this message!

Please go to the relevant section of this comment in order to make both your and my life easier :)

1. Errors when starting the app like: the chat area is all blue
2. (Obsolete) I get an error when upgrading packages

Now, to the resolutions!

1. The app opens but I got a blue screen and nothing more / The app refuses to start / ...

The package depends on Node.js native stuff which are compiled at build time, which makes it break on Electron updates.

With a PKGBUILD between 2020-11-15 till 2021-09-08, you should always have gad a correct matching between Electron and Franz versions.

After 2021-09-08, while the Electron packages follows just the official Arch package dependency, as it is based on not-rolling versions (AKA following a specific Electron branch) breakages are unlikely.

If you would like to help me on this, whenever you have problems starting it, do the following:

1. Open Franz
2. Franz is broken: maybe for a recent update?
3. Reinstall Franz from AUR; this will make it rebuild the native blobs
4. Re-open Franz
5. Franz should work fine; if so, it was a Node.js/Electron/else update problem

If the above steps help you, report the package as outdated here and write in the comment something like:

Electron update broke Franz

If you have some other issues, you should open the developer tools and give me its output, in addition to what is your environment, so I can figure out if it is a packaging issue (my job to fix) or an upstream/code issue (their job to fix); in the second case, I will open a bug request and mention it in a comment, so that you can track it.

2. (Obsolete) I cannot upgrade Electron

The following resolution is not valid since 2021-09-08, it is kept for historic purposes

This is intended; since the PKGBUILD for Franz 5.5.0-4, the package marks as dependency a version-locked Electron package in order to avoid issues with binary modules over upgrades.

In such scenario, you should, assuming _electron="electron" in the PKGBUILD (meaning the Electron used is bundled in the package electron):

1. Mark this package as out of date
2. Do you regular updates with: pacman -Syu --ignore electron

If you want however to upgrade the Electron package, do

1. Upgrade the electron package with pacman -S --assume-installed electron=FRANZ.REQUIRED.VERSION electron
2. Rebuild Franz if needed

Hope this was a good explanation, might get updates if I missed something :)

If you have troubles, read this message!

Please go to the relevant section of this comment in order to make both your and my life easier :)

1. Errors when starting the app like: the chat area is all blue
2. (Obsolete) I get an error when upgrading packages

Now, to the resolutions!

1. The app opens but I got a blue screen and nothing more / The app refuses to start / ...

The package depends on Node.js native stuff which are compiled at build time, which makes it break on Electron updates.

With a PKGBUILD between 2020-11-15 till 2021-09-08, you should always have gad a correct matching between Electron and Franz versions.

After 2021-09-08, while the Electron packages follows just the official Arch package dependency, as it is based on not-rolling versions (AKA following a specific Electron branch) breakages are unlikely.

If you would like to help me on this, whenever you have problems starting it, do the following:

1. Open Franz
2. Franz is broken: maybe for a recent update?
3. Reinstall Franz from AUR; this will make it rebuild the native blobs
4. Re-open Franz
5. Franz should work fine; if so, it was a Node.js/Electron/else update problem

If the above steps help you, report the package as outdated here and write in the comment something like:

Electron update broke Franz

If you have some other issues, you should open the developer tools and give me its output, in addition to what is your environment, so I can figure out if it is a packaging issue (my job to fix) or an upstream/code issue (their job to fix); in the second case, I will open a bug request and mention it in a comment, so that you can track it.

2. (Obsolete) I cannot upgrade Electron

The following resolution is not valid since 2021-09-08, it is kept for historic purposes

This is intended; since the PKGBUILD for Franz 5.5.0-4, the package marks as dependency a version-locked Electron package in order to avoid issues with binary modules over upgrades.

In such scenario, you should, assuming _electron="electron" in the PKGBUILD (meaning the Electron used is bundled in the package electron):

1. Mark this package as out of date
2. Do you regular updates with: pacman -Syu --ignore electron

If you want however to upgrade the Electron package, do

1. Upgrade the electron package with pacman -S --assume-installed electron=FRANZ.REQUIRED.VERSION electron
2. Rebuild Franz if needed

Hope this was a good explanation, might get updates if I missed something :)

@xored I tested it and it was working. As it uses native Node.js stuff, you have to rebuild it every time there is a Node.js / Electron update.

Actually, thanks for pointing this out, should do a pinned comment for this.

As usual, broken again as on very single update :)

Hi @dreieck

1. That's impossible as many packages are not properly Arch-packaged, thus npm is the only way to install them.
2. That is more reasonable; will do when I come back from my holidays.

It seems that it downloads stuff in build(). This should not happen, every data needed to build the package should already be there during build(). Please download everything needed with the source-array or, as an exception if that is not possible, in prepare().

Hi @everyone, Was on a business trip until Saturday. Will update the package ASAP.

Thanks everyone ! You're the best !

Hey, @AG_Caesar thanks for the tip, will do it soon. @everyone sorry for the delay in updating this but life is quite busy recently!

@plooff Change all occurrences of electron to electron4 (remember franz.sh) and it will work again :) Just changed it in my ferdi fork bould and it works great

Does franz still works ? It stopped working since the package electron refers to the version 5 and electron version 4 is electron4.