flatpak-builder is a tool for building flatpaks from sources.

It reads a JSON or YAML based manifest to automatically download, build, and install projects which eventually get exported into a flatpak.

For information on the manifest format see man flatpak-manifest. A JSON Schema for this format is available here.

To use the JSON schema, in an editor with support for schemas, you can include this line in your manifest:

  "$schema": "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/flatpak/flatpak-builder/main/data/flatpak-manifest.schema.json"

For information on the command-line tool see man flatpak-builder or the online documentation.

Installation

Flatpak-builder uses the Meson build system. To build just do:

 meson setup _build
 meson install -C _build

Configure arguments are documented in meson_options.txt.

Versioning Policy

Flatpak Builder, like Flatpak, follows the GLib-style versioning policy, where the version is formatted as MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH. The MAJOR version is currently set to 1.

• Odd MINOR versions indicate an unstable release.
• Even MINOR versions indicate a stable release.

Stable releases are limited to bug fixes and minor, non-breaking improvements. Each stable release line is maintained on a dedicated flatpak-builder-1.MINOR.x branch.

At any given time, only one unstable release line and only one stable release line are supported.

Supported versions

The currently supported release lines are:

Release line	Supported	Status
1.5.x	Yes	Development branch
1.4.x	Yes	Stable branch

Runtime dependencies

The flatpak-builder tool requires flatpak being available on the host to function. Depending on the manifest used it also requires some commands be available on the host.

Very commonly used:

• sh
• patch
• tar
• cp
• git
• 7z
• bsdunzip (libarchive)
• git-lfs

Rarely used:

• rpm2cpio & cpio
• svn
• bzr

Maintainance docs

Please see the maintainance docs.