ASAR/Unpacked Directory Access Failure in Production Build

[alexlzg]

Description

After building an Electron application with npm run build:linux, the production executable fails to start because fs.exists() returns false for the generatedRoot directory, even though the directory exists in both app.asar and app.asar.unpacked. The development mode (npm run dev) works perfectly.

• Library Version: 1.8.0
• ROS Version: jazzy
• Platform / OS: ubuntu 24

Steps To Reproduce

source /opt/ros/jazzy/setup.bash

npm run dev

Application starts successfully

npm run build:linux
./dist/linux-arm64-unpacked/myApp

Application fails cause by const exist = await fse.exists(generatedRoot) return false

Expected Behavior

Actual Behavior

[minggangw]

Hi @alexlzg Thanks for submitting the issue, I landed a fix onto develop branch, I tested with unit test locally and it works, can you test with

"rclnodejs":"RobotWebTools/rclnodejs#develop"

in your package.json to verify from your side? Thanks!

[alexlzg]

Thanks @minggangw . I will test the develop branch to see if the issue is resolved later.

I've temporarily patched rosidl_gen/index.js using patch-package with the following modification:

const generatedRoot = path.join(__dirname, '../generated/');
Modified to:

const generatedRoot = process.env.RCLNODEJS_GENERATED_DIR || path.join(__dirname, '../generated/');

In main/index.ts, I set the RCLNODEJS_GENERATED_DIR environment variable to point to the correct unpacked directory path

Configured asarUnpack to unpack: debug, ms, bindings, and related modules

This workaround allows the application to function but isn't ideal.

[minggangw]

Thanks! Meanwhile, I notice Electron already has fixed the issue 10 years ago electron/electron#6598, not sure why it still breaks.

[alexlzg]

Hi, @minggangw I test the develop branch and it's ok now.

[minggangw]

Fixed by #1375