Build from source#

A development build runs against a checkout of the ThinkWatch Lite repository. To install the released app instead, see Install and update.

Run#

On Linux, install the WebKitGTK, AppIndicator and D-Bus development packages first. On Ubuntu or Debian:

sudo apt install libwebkit2gtk-4.1-dev build-essential curl wget file libxdo-dev \
  libssl-dev libayatana-appindicator3-dev librsvg2-dev dbus

pnpm install
pnpm tauri dev

pnpm tauri dev needs no network and downloads nothing: it looks for a twcore binary in a sibling thinkwatch-core checkout. A development build never updates itself.

Build a bundle#

pnpm tauri build

On macOS this produces a self-contained .app; on Windows, an NSIS installer; on Linux, an AppImage. The twcore inside it is downloaded from a ThinkWatch Core release and checksum-verified rather than copied out of a sibling checkout, so which build was distributed is determined by that release and not by the state of a local working copy. Which release is decided by the tag that Cargo.lock resolved for tw-api, so the protocol mirror compiled into the app and the binary shipped beside it always come from one Core commit.

The macOS bundle is neither signed by a registered Apple developer nor notarized, and it is built for Apple Silicon only. The Windows installer is not code-signed.

Platforms#

Releases are built for macOS on Apple Silicon, for Windows on x64 and ARM64, and for Linux on x86_64 and aarch64.

Next steps#

• Architecture: the structure of the app and how it communicates with Core.
• Contributing: the checks required before opening a pull request.