novelWriter 2.7: Appimage in Manjaro not work

[davdave]

Hello everyone,

I am writing to report a problem with the appimage. In Manjaro (Xfce) up to version 2.6.3, the integration with the OS worked perfectly. Today I downloaded V.2.7 but after the integration novelWriter does not start.
Is it possible to check whether this is a problem related only to Manjaro?

Thank you

[vkbo]

Could you please try to run it from the command line to see if there are any error messages?

[vkbo]

Thank you. That helps a lot. It confirms that we're seeing the same issue.

[HeyMyian]

See: cursor/cursor#2905

I'm getting an additional error with the original 2.7 file that is not present in the link. Maybe it helps:

$ ./novelWriter-2.7.AppImage
Failed to enable unit: Unit file appimagelauncherd.service does not exist.
Failed to start appimagelauncherd.service: Unit appimagelauncherd.service not found.
Squashfs image uses (null) compression, this version supports only xz, zlib.
ERROR: appimage_shall_not_be_integrated : sqfs_open_image error: /home/xxx/Applications/novelWriter-2.7.AppImage
AppImageLauncher error: appimage_shall_not_be_integrated() failed (returned -1)
Squashfs image uses (null) compression, this version supports only xz, zlib.
ERROR: appimage_is_terminal_app : sqfs_open_image error: /home/xxx/Applications/novelWriter-2.7.AppImage
AppImageLauncher error: appimage_is_terminal_app() failed (returned -1)
fuse: memory allocation failed
squashfuse 0.5.2 (c) 2012 Dave Vasilevsky

Usage: squashfuse [options] ARCHIVE MOUNTPOINT
[... identical error message from here]

[vkbo]

I've uploaded two new AppImages in https://github.com/vkbo/novelWriter/releases/tag/v2.7

• Python 3.12: novelwriter-debug-2.7-py312-x86_64.AppImage
• Python 3.13: novelwriter-debug-2.7-py313-x86_64.AppImage

Both of them include the missing library, and both work for me testing on Mint 21.3. Could those of you with issues on other distros test the two?

I'm testing without libxcb-cursor0 installed. I would also like to hear back if any of them are causing the fuse error as well.

If this works, I'll release 2.7.1 with the new AppImage build scripts.

(Sorry for posting this multiple times. I'm posting it to all 3 threads discussing this.)

[HeyMyian]

Python 3.12: novelwriter-debug-2.7-py312-x86_64.AppImage
Python 3.13: novelwriter-debug-2.7-py313-x86_64.AppImage

Both files start fine on KDE neon with AppImage Launcher 2.2.0, 3.0.0-alpha-4, and no AppImage Launcher. 👍 No errors in the console.

Is there anything else critical to test other than launching the application?

[vkbo]

Is there anything else critical to test other than launching the application?

No, there shouldn't be. The app itself should be fine. It's just whether the fuse part works and that Qt can find all libraries it needs.

The two changes I made were that I'm letting python-appimage, which creates the base image that supports Python, only create the files structure needed for the image. Then I inject the libxcb-cursor0, and then package the image with the standard appimagetool executable.

I'm wondering if the fuse error from before has to do with how python-appimage does the packaging. I don't know. But that's why I created a 3.13 image as well. I'll stick to that for 2.7.1 then.

[xahodo]

Tested the AppImage on Linux Mint 22.1. Here's the result:

qt.qpa.plugin: From 6.5.0, xcb-cursor0 or libxcb-cursor0 is needed to load the Qt xcb platform plugin.
qt.qpa.plugin: Could not load the Qt platform plugin "xcb" in "" even though it was found.
This application failed to start because no Qt platform plugin could be initialized. Reinstalling the application may fix this problem.

Available platform plugins are: eglfs, linuxfb, minimal, minimalegl, offscreen, vkkhrdisplay, vnc, wayland-egl, wayland, xcb.

/tmp/.mount_novelWdpbbEc/usr/bin/python3.13: regel 25:  4274 Afgebroken              (geheugendump gemaakt) "$APPDIR/opt/python3.13/bin/python3.13" "$@"

Translated Dutch words to English:
Regel -> Line
Afgebroken -> Aborted
Geheugendump gamaakt -> Memorydump made

I couldn't find the memorydump file.

Note: the .deb functions as expected.

[vkbo]

Well, I just bypassed the issue rather than solve it.

Looks like I may have to redo the whole AppImage build setup to work with Qt6.

[xahodo]

The workaround works on Linux Mint 22.1.

[vkbo]

I've uploaded two new AppImages in https://github.com/vkbo/novelWriter/releases/tag/v2.7

• Python 3.12: novelwriter-debug-2.7-py312-x86_64.AppImage
• Python 3.13: novelwriter-debug-2.7-py313-x86_64.AppImage

Both of them include the missing library, and both work for me testing on Mint 21.3. Could those of you with issues on other distros test the two?

I'm testing without libxcb-cursor0 installed. I would also like to hear back if any of them are causing the fuse error as well.

If this works, I'll release 2.7.1 with the new AppImage build scripts.

(Sorry for posting this multiple times. I'm posting it to all 3 threads discussing this.)

[davdave]

Hi,
I tried both AppImages:
novelwriter-debug-2.7-py312-x86_64.AppImage
novelwriter-debug-2.7-py313-x86_64.AppImage

start up perfectly and novelWriter runs fine in Manjaro 25.0.3 Xfce.

[vkbo]

Thanks for testing!

[arnehemingway]

Both AppImages:
novelwriter-debug-2.7-py312-x86_64.AppImage
novelwriter-debug-2.7-py313-x86_64.AppImage
... start and survive multiple suspend/resumes on Mint 21.3 and also on Mint 20.1 (which does not have libxcb-cursor0 installed)

[vkbo]

Almost every report I've seen on the AppImage with Fuse error has been caused by appimagelauncherd. I just want to make double sure the service isn't running on your setup.

[davdave]

I uninstalled app image launcherd and realised I don't have an alternative app. What do you recommend for starting an appimage? I tried Gear Lever but it doesn't work

[vkbo]

Honestly, I usually just double-click the few AppImages I use 😄

But as @HeyMyian wrote here the 3.0.0 Alpha release of AppImageLauncher works. It's 4 months old though, so not sure why the 3.0 release has not been made.

I wish I knew why there's a difference between the images built on Python 3.11 and 3.13, and why the 3.13 image built on Debian 12 works, but the one built on Ubuntu 22.04 does not. 😒

[davdave]

Thank you for these pointers. It will be a long search for me, but in time I will find a solution 👍

[vkbo]

I can try to debug further, but if there's a bug with AppImageLauncher, it's on them too. At this point it is unclear, and I've seen tons of issue reports on various projects releasing AppImages.