self-update: Build self-updating Fyne programs

Package update provides functionality to implement secure, self-updating Fyne programs (or other single-file targets)

A program can update itself by replacing its executable file with a new version.

It provides the flexibility to implement different updating user experiences like auto-updating, or manual user-initiated updates. It also boasts advanced features like binary patching and code signing verification.

Unmanaged update

Example of updating from a URL:

import (
    "fmt"
    "net/http"

    "github.com/fynelabs/selfupdate"
)

func doUpdate(url string) error {
    resp, err := http.Get(url)
    if err != nil {
        return err
    }
    defer resp.Body.Close()
    err = update.Apply(resp.Body, update.Options{})
    if err != nil {
        // error handling
    }
    return err
}

Managed update

To help make self updating Fyne application a new API and a tool, selfupdatectl have been introduced. The new API allow to provide a source where to get an update, configure a schedule for the update and a ed25519 public key to ensure that the update is only applied if they come from the proper source.

Example with the new API:

import (
	"crypto/ed25519"
	"log"
	"time"

	"github.com/fynelabs/selfupdate"
)

func main() {
	done := make(chan struct{}, 2)

	// Used `selfupdatectl create-keys` followed by `selfupdatectl print-key`
	publicKey := ed25519.PublicKey{178, 103, 83, 57, 61, 138, 18, 249, 244, 80, 163, 162, 24, 251, 190, 241, 11, 168, 179, 41, 245, 27, 166, 70, 220, 254, 118, 169, 101, 26, 199, 129}

	// The public key above match the signature of the below file served by our CDN
	httpSource := selfupdate.NewHTTPSource(nil, "http://localhost/{{.Executable}}-{{.OS}}-{{.Arch}}{{.Ext}}")
	config := &selfupdate.Config{
		Source:    httpSource,
		Schedule:  selfupdate.Schedule{FetchOnStart: true, Interval: time.Minute * time.Duration(60)},
		PublicKey: publicKey,

		ProgressCallback: func(f float64, err error) { log.Println("Download", f, "%") },
		RestartConfirmCallback: func() bool { return true},
		UpgradeConfirmCallback: func(_ string) bool { return true },
		ExitCallback: func(_ error) { os.Exit(1) }
	}

	_, err := selfupdate.Manage(config)
	if err != nil {
		log.Println("Error while setting up update manager: ", err)
		return
	}

	<-done
}

If you desire a GUI element and visual integration with Fyne, you should check fyneselfupdate.

To help you manage your key, sign binary and upload them to an online S3 bucket the selfupdatectl tool is provided. You can check its documentation here.

Logging

We provide three package wide variables: LogError, LogInfo and LogDebug that follow log.Printf API to provide an easy way to hook any logger in. To use it with go logger, you can just do

selfupdate.LogError = log.Printf

If you are using logrus for example, you could do the following:

selfupdate.LogError = logrus.Errorf
selfupdate.LogInfo = logrus.Infof
selfupdate.LogDebug = logrus.Debugf

Most logger module in the go ecosystem do provide an API that match the log.Printf and it should be straight forward to use in the same way as with logrus.

Features

• Cross platform support
• Binary patch application
• Checksum verification
• Code signing verification
• Support for updating arbitrary files

API Compatibility Promises

The main branch of selfupdate is not guaranteed to have a stable API over time. Still we will try hard to not break its API unecessarily and will follow a proper versioning of our release when necessary.

The selfupdate package makes the following promises about API compatibility:

1. A list of all API-breaking changes will be documented in this README.
2. selfupdate will strive for as few API-breaking changes as possible.

API Breaking Changes

• May 30, 2022: Many changes moving to a new API that will be supported going forward.
• June 22, 2022: First tagged release, v0.1.0.

License

Apache

Sponsors

This project is kindly sponsored by the following companies: