Electron-builder: Unable to load native addon after electron-builder

[nikola-matic]

• Version: 19.35.1

• Target: Windows 10 x64

Hi all,
I'm trying to package an Electron application with a custom native addon (i.e. written by me), and have been unsuccessful so far. The app builds, but when I run it, it's unable to load the native module, and exits.

Running the app locally, with electron . works just fine, which leads me to believe that the native module has not been packaged with the executable.

My package.json looks like this:

{
  "build": {
    "appId": "App name",
    "productName": "App company",
    "copyright": "Copyright © 2017 App Inc.",
    "nsis": {},
    "win": {
      "target": "nsis"
    },
    "mac": {
      "target": "dmg"
    }
  },
  "scripts": {
    "pack": "electron-builder --dir",
    "dist": "electron-builder -w --x64 --ia32"
  },
  "postinstall": "electron-builder install-app-deps",
  "devDependencies": {
    "electron-builder": "^19.6.3"
  }
}

And the app directory structure like this:

application-root-dir
    -app
        -addon
            -build
                -Release
                    -addon.node
                -addon.sln
        -node_modules
        -main.js
        -package.json
    -build
    -node_modules
    -package.json

Addon source code and MSVC project files, as well as *.node files are all in application-root-dir/app/addon/*

When I run npm run dist, I get the following output:

> electron-builder -w --x64 --ia32

electron-builder 19.35.1
No native production dependencies
Packaging for win32 x64 using electron 1.6.14 to dist\win-unpacked
No native production dependencies
Packaging for win32 ia32 using electron 1.6.14 to dist\win-ia32-unpacked
Building nsis installer (x64 and ia32)

So, everything seemingly builds just fine, and the app installs successfully, but when I try to run, it's unable to load the native module (from main.js), and just exits. Below is the manner in which I load/require the module:

var addon

try {
  addon= worker (
    path.join(__dirname, './addon/build/Release/addon'), 
    {name: 'addon'}
  );
}
catch(err) {
  try {
    addon= worker (
      path.join(__dirname, './addon/build/Debug/addon'),
      {name: 'addon'}
    );
  }
  catch(err) {
    log.error('Unable to load addon, exiting app...')
    app.exit()
  }
}

Any help would be appreciated.

[nikola-matic]

Settings "nodeGypRebuild":"true" in root package.json solved above issue.

[edudar]

Does not work for me though. It says Executing node-gyp rebuild for arch x64 during build because of that option set in config but packaged app contains no *.node whatsoever.

A section of asar listing where build/Release/*.node should be

...
/.cache/4e1a5069de66f1b2f52927c2388cdfb0756c1285/dbbf1d131492e21ad126f690015bc5785a84e466
/binding.gyp
/package.json
/node_modules
/node_modules/ansi-regex
...

$ electron-builder --version
19.47.1

[nikola-matic]

@edudar yeah, it worked for me the first time around, and then stopped working after that. Ended up ditching Electron in the end, so there's that.

[edudar]

Using debug output I got electron-builder-debug.yml where there's a line that precisely excludes everything in build directory from being packaged. That is not the line from package.json provided so I assume these are auto-generated by the builder itself. Not sure how this was supposed to work at all...

x64:
  firstOrDefaultFilePatterns:
    - '**/*'
    - node_modules/**/*
    - '!build{,/**/*}'
    - '!dist{,/**/*}'

@nikola-matic maybe reopen this ticket then?

[edudar]

So the workaround is simple as I appended && mkdir ./Release && cp ./build/Release/addon.node ./Release to my install script as Release is a potential place where addons are looked up at and it's not excluded from packaging.

[Cprofessor3]

@nikola-matic Did you solve this problem? Same for me. Please help!

[nikola-matic]

@Cprofessor3 unfortunately not; in the end, we moved away from electron and used CEF instead.

[Cprofessor3]

@nikola-matic Thanks!

[Cprofessor3]

@nikola-matic Hi, luckly I find out how it works. Two points. Firstly, electron-builder will ignore [builid/] when building exe. So I renamed [build] to [out], and then require addon from [out]. Secondly, all the [.dll] files should placed in the folder where you-app is placed in. {"extraFiles": ["/.dll"]} in package.json in "build" will work. Hope it helpful.