Can't run today's snap/edge 2019-09-11

[wujastyk]

Platform:

NAME="Linux Mint"
VERSION="19.2 (Tina)"
ID=linuxmint
ID_LIKE=ubuntu
PRETTY_NAME="Linux Mint 19.2"
VERSION_ID="19.2"

JabRef version:

$ snap info jabref
name:      jabref
summary:   Bibliography manager
publisher: Oliver Kopp (koppor)
contact:   https://github.com/koppor
license:   unset
description: |
  JabRef is an open source bibliography reference manager. The native file format used by
  JabRef is BibTeX, the standard LaTeX bibliography format.
commands:
  - jabref
snap-id:      T5x6neyM0Uc9OWDHGorm61NKxh3Bd47k
tracking:     edge
refresh-date: today at 17:41 MDT
channels:
  stable:    –                              
  candidate: –                              
  beta:      5.0-dev 2019-08-26 (530) 212MB -
  edge:      5.0-dev 2019-09-11 (531) 256MB -
installed:   5.0-dev            (531) 256MB -

Result of executing /snap/bin/jabref:

$ /snap/bin/jabref
Picked up _JAVA_OPTIONS: -Duser.home=/home/dom/snap/jabref/531
Error: Could not find or load main class org.jabref.org.jabref.JabRefLauncher
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException: org.jabref.org.jabref.JabRefLauncher

[Siedlerchr]

I will trigger a manual build later so that yesterday's fixes for snap are included.
Thanks for the report

[Siedlerchr]

I now triggered a manual build. Please try again. If you encounter any bugs, please report them.

[wujastyk]

edge: 5.0-dev 2019-09-12 (532) 391MB Starts fine. Many thanks!

[Siedlerchr]

Thanks for the feedback!
It would be really nice if s you could update the help page for the installation and add a short note that JabRef is also available as snap. https://help.jabref.org/en/Installation#jabref-5x (At the bottom of the page, "Edit this page")

Again many thanks @LyzardKing for making the snap java 11 compatible.

[LyzardKing]

@wujastyk Great feedback! Let me know if there's something not working in the snap!

@Siedlerchr
There are some more snap fixes coming...I'm working to reduce the snap size...I managed to remove 100MB removing the system jvm(using the jlink it's not needed any more)
Also the upstream fix for the plugin is on its way...
It might be a good idea once these issues are sorted to promote a snap to stable and promote it on the snapcraft forum and/or jabref forum/website...what do you think? ;)

[Siedlerchr]

@LyzardKing Thanks for the work! 🥇 That's good to hear that the fix is on it's way to upstream.
We definitely have the idea of promoting the snap and to deploy it in the Ubuntu store.
But with an official promotion I would wait until we release a beta of JabRef 5.0 so that all releases are in sync. But you could add a note to the install wiki page.

You might also want to check out the "snap" label here on issues, sometimes it could be related to a snap if it's not reproducible in the normal system and I don't always have a Linux system at hands.
We also managed to get the non-snap build working for Linux again with jlink.

This jlink might make it also easier for (debian/ubuntu/whatever distro) package maintainers?
Cause the last version which made it into the repos was 3.8...

[wujastyk]

Again today, snap/edge of 26 September 2019. I get this:

$/snap/bin/jabref 
ln: failed to create symbolic link '/home/dom/snap/jabref/543/.config/gtk-2.0/gtkfilechooser.ini': File exists
/snap/jabref/543/bin/desktop-launch: line 574: /snap/jabref/543/jabref/bin/JabRefMain: No such file or directory

[LyzardKing]

I guess the name changed to Jabref...
I just downloaded the tarfile.

[tobiasdiez]

Yes, the name changed. Moreover, it should be possible to download https://builds.jabref.org/master/JabRef-portable_linux.tar.gz and run it. So the snap does not need to build via gradle (at least if this is not one of the requirements of a snap - no idea about conventions there).

[LyzardKing]

To be honest, it could be easier, since you already have your build system, to pull the tarball and use that directly.
I'm not sure if the snapcraft build system can see that the tarfile changed and to that, but since you are using github actions (or travis) it can be added to the ci I believe

[tobiasdiez]

You mean that we should build and push the snap during our build? That's definitely possible (see e.g. https://github.com/sirredbeard/nim_lang_snap/blob/master/.github/workflows/nightly.yml). But maybe there was/is a reason why it's not done. @koppor @Siedlerchr ?