Electron-builder: Build with codesign takes a long time when 'nodegit' is in my dependencies

[matthewtoast]

• Version: 11.3.0

• Target: Mac

Problem:

I am trying to build a project that has [email protected] as a dependency. When I run:

CSC_LINK={mycertfilepath} CSC_KEY_PASSWORD={mypass} build --mac

The build takes a long time (i.e. never finishes). On my MacBook Pro (Retina, Mid 2012) running MacOS Sierra, the "Rebuilding" and "Packaging" steps take ~5 minutes, which is a bit slow. For the "Signing" step, however, I've waited 30+ minutes and never seen it finish.

With nodegit deleted from "dependencies", the build finishes in seconds.

Details:

A minimal package.json that reproduces the issue looks like this:

{
  "name": "repro-nodegit-electron-build-demo",
  "version": "0.0.0",
  "private": true,
  "description": "Minimal test of building Electron with nodegit and codesigning",
  "main": "index.js",
  "author": "Matthew",
  "engines": {
    "node": "6.6.0",
    "npm": "3.10.3",
    "electron": "1.4.5"
  },
  "build": {
    "appId": "com.electron.nodegitelectronbuilddemo",
    "copyright": "none",
    "productName": "nodegitelectronbuilddemo",
    "forceCodeSigning": true,
    "electronVersion": "1.4.5",
    "mac": {
      "category": "public.app-category.developer-tools"
    }
  },
  "scripts": {
    "build": "build --mac"
  },
  "dependencies": {
    "nodegit": "0.16.0"
  },
  "devDependencies": {
    "electron-builder": "11.3.0"
  }
}

(To repro the signing slowness, you would need to get a developer certificate, etc.)

Hypotheses:

Based on the output of $ ps ax | grep codesign while running the build, my guess is that there are simply so many files to sign that it is just taking a long time. I see it signing a lot of files that seem ancillary.

With that in mind, these are my hypotheses:

• I am supposed to somehow pre-bundle my code before using electron-builder. (I.e. concatenate my JavaScript files, etc., so that there are fewer files to sign?)

• I am supposed to configure the "files" build option so that code-signing doesn't have to trawl through a bunch of ancillary files. (It looks like nodegit and its dependencies are rather huge, and there are some test/VCS artifacts also being signed.)

• I have misconfigured the installation of nodegit somehow, resulting in a big complicated bundle.

• I am supposed to pre-compile nodegit down to a single bundle before using it here.

• Waiting over 30 minutes in my scenario is normal. This is simply a fact of life I will have to accept if I want to include nodegit in my project.

• I am supposed to use the two-package.json setup.

Am I onto something with any of these? Any tips or suggestions?

Apologies if I've missed some important note in the documentation that pertains to this.

[matthewtoast]

When I ps ax | grep codesign as the codesign step is working, I see output like:

codesign --sign {name_of_my_developer_id_certificate} --force --keychain {target_file_in_temp_folder} node_modules/vendor/libgit2/tests/resources/merge-resolve/.gitted/objects/54/269b3f6ec3d7d4ede24dd350dd5d605495c3ae

So it looks like codesign is going deep into hidden folders, including VCS databases, and signing all of those entries too. That's a _lot_ to sign. Which explains the wait.

---

My workaround is to add some "files" entries to the build config in my package.json, so that there are fewer files for codesign to crunch:

"build": {
  "files": [
    // ...snip...
    "!node_modules/nodegit",
    "node_modules/nodegit/package.json",
    "node_modules/nodegit/dist/**",
    "node_modules/nodegit/build/Release/nodegit.node",
    // ...snip...
  ]
}

First I exclude the whole nodegit package from my app bundle. Then, I re-include only the parts of nodegit necessary for it to work.

I did this through trial and error, so my file patterns are probably excluding some critical file. But this at least gets the build working, and I don't initially see any problems with require('nodegit') when I launch my packaged app.

[matthewtoast]

I think it's unlikely there will be a lot of commentary on this one, so I'm going to close it.

[develar]

@matthewtoast No, it will be investigated and fixed when I will have time :)

[develar]

Solution — do not use npm. Use yarn and execute yarn clean. All junk directories like vendor/libgit2/tests will be removed.

[fab1an]

I have a similar problem, but I don't want to use yarn (I used it for a year, but switch back to npm after various troubles with it).

For me codesign, the final package _CodeSignature contains entries like:

                <key>Resources/app.asar.unpacked/node_modules/lzz-gyp/package.json</key>
        <dict>
            <key>hash</key>
            <data>
            V46JaYPK9FUORjoONzTgww3ovBo=
            </data>
            <key>hash2</key>
            <data>
            c2Zqm6KAgz7BZzpLOD8K9yrP1ocqjCjA0V/jJv58gc0=
            </data>
        </dict>

• Is this needed?
• Are signatures for .cpp or .dylib needed?

[develar]

Yes, such files must be signed. Because it is library.

[develar]

You can try to add ignores to files option if some files are not required for you.

[andrewluetgers]

Curious if this still applies in 2019? Apparently https://yarnpkg.com/lang/en/docs/cli/autoclean/ is the current command and there are separate packages that can accomplish this for npm users such as https://github.com/tj/node-prune

[ppoliani]

Has this been sorted? I couldn't make it the codesign complete