Building

This guide covers building Kuse Cowork for distribution.

Build Requirements

Ensure you have all prerequisites from Development Setup.

Development Build

# Quick development build
pnpm tauri build --debug

Output: src-tauri/target/debug/

Production Build

Local Build

# Full production build
pnpm tauri build

Output locations:

• macOS: src-tauri/target/release/bundle/dmg/
• Windows: src-tauri/target/release/bundle/msi/
• Linux: src-tauri/target/release/bundle/deb/

Platform-Specific Builds

macOS

# Build for current architecture
pnpm tauri build

# Build for specific architecture
pnpm tauri build --target aarch64-apple-darwin  # Apple Silicon
pnpm tauri build --target x86_64-apple-darwin   # Intel

# Universal binary (both architectures)
pnpm tauri build --target universal-apple-darwin

# Output formats:
# .app - Application bundle
# .dmg - Disk image
# .pkg - Installer package

Windows

# Build for Windows
pnpm tauri build

# Build specific format
pnpm tauri build --bundles msi
pnpm tauri build --bundles nsis

# Output formats:
# .exe - Executable
# .msi - MSI installer
# *-setup.exe - NSIS installer

Linux

# Build for Linux
pnpm tauri build

# Build specific format
pnpm tauri build --bundles deb
pnpm tauri build --bundles appimage
pnpm tauri build --bundles rpm

# Output formats:
# .deb - Debian package
# .rpm - Red Hat package
# .AppImage - Universal Linux app

Build Configuration

Tauri Config

src-tauri/tauri.conf.json:

{
  "build": {
    "beforeBuildCommand": "pnpm build",
    "beforeDevCommand": "pnpm dev",
    "devUrl": "http://localhost:1420",
    "frontendDist": "../dist"
  },
  "bundle": {
    "active": true,
    "category": "DeveloperTool",
    "icon": [
      "icons/32x32.png",
      "icons/128x128.png",
      "icons/icon.icns",
      "icons/icon.ico"
    ],
    "identifier": "com.kuse-cowork.app",
    "targets": "all"
  },
  "productName": "Kuse Cowork",
  "version": "0.1.0"
}

Cargo Release Profile

src-tauri/Cargo.toml:

[profile.release]
lto = true
opt-level = "s"
codegen-units = 1
panic = "abort"
strip = true

Cross-Compilation

From macOS

# Build for Windows (requires mingw)
brew install mingw-w64
rustup target add x86_64-pc-windows-gnu
pnpm tauri build --target x86_64-pc-windows-gnu

From Linux

# Build for Windows (requires mingw)
sudo apt install mingw-w64
rustup target add x86_64-pc-windows-gnu
pnpm tauri build --target x86_64-pc-windows-gnu

CI/CD Build

GitHub Actions

.github/workflows/build.yml:

name: Build

on:
  push:
    tags:
      - 'v*'

jobs:
  build:
    strategy:
      matrix:
        include:
          - os: macos-latest
            target: aarch64-apple-darwin
          - os: macos-latest
            target: x86_64-apple-darwin
          - os: windows-latest
            target: x86_64-pc-windows-msvc
          - os: ubuntu-latest
            target: x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu

    runs-on: ${{ matrix.os }}

    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4

      - name: Setup Node
        uses: actions/setup-node@v4
        with:
          node-version: 20

      - name: Setup pnpm
        uses: pnpm/action-setup@v2
        with:
          version: 8

      - name: Install Rust
        uses: dtolnay/rust-action@stable
        with:
          targets: ${{ matrix.target }}

      - name: Install dependencies (Linux)
        if: matrix.os == 'ubuntu-latest'
        run: |
          sudo apt-get update
          sudo apt-get install -y libwebkit2gtk-4.1-dev libayatana-appindicator3-dev

      - name: Install frontend dependencies
        run: pnpm install

      - name: Build
        run: pnpm tauri build --target ${{ matrix.target }}

      - name: Upload artifacts
        uses: actions/upload-artifact@v4
        with:
          name: binaries-${{ matrix.target }}
          path: src-tauri/target/${{ matrix.target }}/release/bundle/

Code Signing

macOS

1. Get Apple Developer certificate
2. Export certificate to .p12
3. Set environment variables:

export APPLE_CERTIFICATE="base64-encoded-p12"
export APPLE_CERTIFICATE_PASSWORD="password"
export APPLE_SIGNING_IDENTITY="Developer ID Application: ..."

4. Build with signing:

pnpm tauri build

Windows

1. Get code signing certificate (EV recommended)
2. Configure in tauri.conf.json:

{
  "bundle": {
    "windows": {
      "certificateThumbprint": "YOUR_THUMBPRINT",
      "digestAlgorithm": "sha256"
    }
  }
}

Notarization

macOS Notarization

1. Configure Apple credentials:

export APPLE_ID="your@email.com"
export APPLE_PASSWORD="app-specific-password"
export APPLE_TEAM_ID="TEAM_ID"

2. Enable in config:

{
  "bundle": {
    "macOS": {
      "entitlements": "entitlements.plist",
      "signingIdentity": "-"
    }
  }
}

Build Optimization

Minimize Binary Size

# Cargo.toml
[profile.release]
lto = true           # Link-time optimization
opt-level = "s"      # Optimize for size
strip = true         # Strip symbols
codegen-units = 1    # Better optimization

Faster Builds

# For development
[profile.dev]
opt-level = 0
debug = true

# For CI
[profile.release]
lto = "thin"         # Faster than full LTO
codegen-units = 16   # Faster compilation

Troubleshooting

Build fails with missing libraries

Linux:

sudo apt install libwebkit2gtk-4.1-dev libayatana-appindicator3-dev

macOS:

xcode-select --install

Code signing fails

1. Verify certificate is valid
2. Check keychain access
3. Ensure correct identity name

Build is too large

1. Enable LTO in release profile
2. Use opt-level = "s" or "z"
3. Strip debug symbols

Cross-compilation fails

1. Install target: rustup target add <target>
2. Install cross-compiler toolchain
3. Check linker configuration

Versioning

Update version in multiple places:

1. package.json:

{ "version": "1.0.0" }

2. src-tauri/Cargo.toml:

version = "1.0.0"

3. src-tauri/tauri.conf.json:

{ "version": "1.0.0" }

Release Checklist

• [ ] Update version numbers
• [ ] Update CHANGELOG.md
• [ ] Run all tests
• [ ] Build for all platforms
• [ ] Test built applications
• [ ] Sign binaries
• [ ] Notarize macOS build
• [ ] Create GitHub release
• [ ] Upload artifacts
• [ ] Update documentation

Next Steps

• Development Setup
• Contributing
• Architecture