XApp Electron

This is a version of XApp built using the electron framework.

Running application

Needs Node.js 22.12 or later (Electron 44); .nvmrc pins 22.16.0. Yarn 4.18.1 comes from packageManager in package.json through corepack, the same as ksg-nett-frontend.

• Clone the repo and cd into it
• Run corepack enable (once per machine)
• Run yarn install
• Run yarn start (builds the window with Vite, then starts Electron)

Electron 44 downloads its binary the first time it starts, not during yarn install.

The app talks to https://ksg-nett.samfundet.no/api/. To use another backend, set XAPP_API_URL:

XAPP_API_URL=http://localhost:8000/api/ yarn start

Development

Run these in two terminals. The first rebuilds the window on changes, the second restarts Electron:

yarn dev
yarn watch

Tests

yarn test runs end-to-end tests with Playwright. Each test starts the app against a fake API (test/fakeApi.js), so no backend is needed. On a Linux machine without a display, run xvfb-run yarn test.

How it is built

The window uses the same stack as ksg-nett-frontend: React 19, Mantine 9, Vite 8, TypeScript and the same Prettier config.

Path	Runs in	Role
main.js	main process	Window, menu (Escape cancels, x confirms), IPC handlers. Loads dist/index.html.
apiClient.js	main process	All REST calls and the token. TLS certificates are checked.
preload.js	bridge	Exposes window.xapp to the window. Nothing else from Node.js or Electron is available there.
renderer/	window	Vite root. src/screens/ (login, products), src/components/ProductCard.tsx, the basket reducer in src/basket.ts. Built into dist/.

The window runs with sandbox, contextIsolation and no nodeIntegration, and cannot navigate.

Ubuntu sandbox

Ubuntu 23.10 and later block the unprivileged user namespaces that Chromium's sandbox needs. If yarn start fails with a sandbox error, do one of these:

• Give the bundled sandbox helper its rights (repeat after each yarn install):

  sudo chown root:root node_modules/electron/dist/chrome-sandbox
  sudo chmod 4755 node_modules/electron/dist/chrome-sandbox

• Or allow user namespaces: sudo sysctl -w kernel.apparmor_restrict_unprivileged_userns=0.

Do not start the app with --no-sandbox.