Electron-builder: Use Node.js platform identifiers

[AlicanC]

electron-builder should use Node.js platform identifiers just like electron-packager does.

So the platform options win and osx should become win32 and darwin.

[justinmchase]

I agree :+1:

[stefanjudis]

Jap, sounds reasonable. :)

[sindresorhus]

:-1: win and osx are a lot more user-friendly. Just because Node.js uses those identifiers doesn't mean it's a good idea. I've seen countless of people being confused that win32 is also the identifier for Windows 64-bit. Also not that clear that darwin is OS X.

[justinmchase]

@sindresorhus Conversely I was confused as heck when it wasn't the same. Additionally, based on my understanding of the way the platforms are arranged, there's no reason why it can't be both:

module.exports = {
  osx   : require( './osx' ),
  win   : require( './win' ),
  win32 : require( './win' )
};

Just add:

darwin : require('./osx'),

And everyone could be happy. It was in a PR a while back too:
https://github.com/loopline-systems/electron-builder/pull/14/files#diff-4b53c119f750f41905184bc503e871c6R10

[AlicanC]

@sindresorhus I suggest you build a cross-platform application and see for yourself if it's user-friendly or not.

Keeping maps from process.platform or process.arch values to custom library values is not user-friendly at all. Node.js uses those values, electron-packager uses those values and even electron uses those values.

No one wants to dig into documentations to figure out if it's "darwin", "macosx", "osx", "mac", "64", "x64", "x86-64" or "amd64" or whatever.

If this confuses a few juniors, so be it.

[stefanjudis]

@sindresorhus @justinmchase @AlicanC

I have to say I'm also on the "consistency" side here.

electron-builder will be used mostly in combination with electron-packager. Using the same identifiers just makes sense here ( if missed that when starting the project ).

Having darwin and osx included doesn't make sense to me. It's configuration and I see no benefit in implementing doubled options for convenience.

To sum up - I still think that the issue here makes sense. :)

Bumping another major version is no problem at all for me ( a bit unlucky - but yeah... it's like it is ).

[havenchyk]

Let's go like it's done right now and close the issue. What do you think, @stefanjudis ?

[develar]

In the new API we still use osx, linux and win in the Distributable Format Configuration.

Because:

• Are a lot more user-friendly.
• Apple officially renames Mac OS X to OS X, drops the 'Mac'
• Travis uses osx as a OS name (not quite relevant, but anyway)

So, @stefanjudis, I want to close issue as a won't fix.
Maybe, to avoid inconsistency, we can introduce new option os and use it instead of platform (deprecate it).

Also, electron-packager uses mas as a platform, but unlikely that we will support it in the same way — my initial proposal (I will open issue to discuss soon) to use ---target=mas and use osx in the distributable format configuration for all OS X targets (as we do in case of NSIS and Squirrel).

[stefanjudis]

So, @stefanjudis, I want to close issue as a won't fix.

:+1:

Maybe, to avoid inconsistency, we can introduce new option os and use it instead of platform (deprecate it).

:+1:

Also, electron-packager uses mas as a platform, but unlikely that we will support it in the same way — my initial proposal (I will open issue to discuss soon) to use ---target=mas and use osx in the distributable format configuration for all OS X targets (as we do in case of NSIS and Squirrel)

:+1:

[develar]

@stefanjudis I am going to allow use osx instead of darwin and win instead of win32 in the platform arg. See #301 "win and osx are a lot more user-friendly."

to avoid inconsistency, we can introduce new option os and use it instead of platform (deprecate it).

Yeah, os is much clear, but I don't want to disturb our users and rename/deprecate. For now, we can just allow to use osx/win.

[stefanjudis]

:+1:

[justinmchase]

:-1:

Platform identifiers in nodejs, for better or worse:
https://nodejs.org/api/os.html#os_os_platform

It's pretty confusing for nodejs developers to have platforms named different from package to package.

[develar]

@justinmchase Both will be supported. So, electron-builder will be still drop-in replacement of electron-packager and logical for nodejs developers accustomed to these identifiers. But for me and other confused users it will allow to use osx/win.

[justinmchase]

Ok great!