NOTE: These instructions are only for packaging a built Metabase uberjar into Metabase.app
. They are not useful if your goal is to work on Metabase itself; for development, please see
our developers' guide.
Steps
The following steps need to be done before building the Mac App:
-
Install XCode.
-
Add a JRE to the
/path/to/metabase/repo/OSX/Metabase/jre
You must acquire a copy of a JRE (make sure you get a JRE rather than JDK) and move it to the correct location in the Mac App source directory so it can be included as part of the Mac App. To ship Java applications as Mac Apps, you must ship them with their own JRE. In this case we want to get a JRE from somewhere (more on this below) and move the
Contents/Home
directory from the JRE archive intoOSX/Metabase/jre
. (OSX/Metabase
already exists inside themetabase/metabase
repo.)Option 1: Download from AdoptOpenJDK (currently broken -- do not use)
You can download a copy of a JRE from https://adoptopenjdk.net/releases.html?jvmVariant=hotspot — make sure you download a JRE rather than JDK. Move the
Contents/Home
directory from the JRE archive intoOSX/Metabase/jre
. (OSX/Metabase
already exists inside themetabase/metabase
repo.) For example:# IMPORTANT -- DO NOT COPY THIS -- THIS JRE DOESN'T WORK cd /path/to/metabase/repo wget https://github.com/AdoptOpenJDK/openjdk11-binaries/releases/download/jdk-11.0.8%2B10/OpenJDK11U-jre_x64_mac_hotspot_11.0.8_10.tar.gz tar -xzvf OpenJDK11U-jre_x64_mac_hotspot_11.0.8_10.tar.gz mv jdk-11.0.8+10-jre/Contents/Home OSX/Metabase/jre
VERY IMPORTANT!
Make sure the JRE version you use is one that is known to work successfully with notarization. We have found out the one linked above does not work. I have found a nightly build that does work, but it's no longer available for download. Cam and Sameer both have copies of a JRE that is known to work. Refer to Option 2.
If you get notarization errors like
The executable does not have the hardened runtime enabled.
(Referring to files in
Metabase.app/Contents/Resources/jre/bin/
) then use a different build of the JRE.Assuming the OpenJDK folks have resolved this issue going forward, you are fine to use whatever the latest JRE version available is. I have been using the HotSpot JRE instead of the OpenJ9 one but it ultimately shouldn't make a difference.
Option 2: Ask Cam or Sameer for known working JRE
Have Cam or Sameer ZIP up their
/path/to/metabase/repo/OSX/Metabase/jre
folder and send it to you. Don't try Option 1 until we know the issues are fixed -
Copy Metabase uberjar to OSX resources dir
cp /path/to/metabase.jar OSX/Resources/metabase.jar
Every time you want to build a new version of the Mac App, you can simply update the bundled uberjar the same way. I usually download the new JAR from
downloads.metabase.com
after it's up and copy that one into place.
At this point, you should try opening up the Xcode project and building the Mac App in Xcode by clicking the run button. The app should build and launch at this point. If it doesn't, ask Cam for help!
The following steps are prereqs for releasing the Mac App:
-
Install XCode command-line tools. In
Xcode
>Preferences
>Locations
select your current Xcode version in theCommand Line Tools
drop-down. -
Install AWS command-line client (if needed)
brew install awscli
-
Configure AWS Credentials for
metabase
profile (used to upload artifacts to S3)You'll need credentials that give you permission to write the metabase-osx-releases S3 bucket. You just need the access key ID and secret key; use the defaults for locale and other options.
aws configure --profile metabase
-
Obtain a copy of the private key for signing app updates (ask Cam) and put a copy of it at
OSX/dsa_priv.pem
cp /path/to/private/key.pem OSX/dsa_priv.pem
-
Add
Apple Developer ID Application Certificate
to your computer's keychain.-
Generate a Certificate Signing Request from the Keychain Access app.
-
Keychain Access
>Certificate Assistant
>Request a Certificate From a Certificate Authority
. -
Enter the email associated with your Apple Developer account.
-
Leave "CA Email Address" blank
-
Choose "Save to Disk"
-
-
Have Sameer go to the Apple Developer Site and generate a
Developer ID Application
certificate for you by uploading the Certificate Signing Request you creating in the last step. -
Load the generated certificate on your computer.
-
-
Export your Apple ID for building the app as
METABASE_MAC_APP_BUILD_APPLE_ID
. (This Apple ID must be part of the Metabase org in the Apple developer site. Ask Cam or Sameer to add you if it isn't.)# Add this to .zshrc or .bashrc export [email protected]
-
Create an App-Specific password for the Apple ID in the previous step
-
Go to https://appleid.apple.com/account/manage then
Security
>App-Specific Passwords
>Generate Password
-
Store the password in Keychain
xcrun altool \ --store-password-in-keychain-item "METABASE_MAC_APP_BUILD_PASSWORD" \ -u "$METABASE_MAC_APP_BUILD_APPLE_ID" \ -p <secret_password>
-
-
Install Clojure CLI. See the instructions on clojure.org for more details.
brew install clojure/tools/clojure
After following the configuration steps above, to build and release the app you can use the build script:
-
Make sure release is published on GitHub and release notes are ready. The script copies these for the update release notes.
-
Make sure you're on the appropriate release branch locally. The script reads the version number from the most recent tag
-
Bundle entire app, and upload to s3
./OSX/release.sh
Important Note Do not let your computer lock the screen while running the script — if the screen is locked, macOS will not allow the script to access your Apple Developer credentials from the Keychain (needed for notarization) and the script will fail.