Desktop Flutter Example

This is the standard Flutter template application, modified to run on desktop.

The linux and windows directories serve as early prototypes of what will eventually become the flutter create templates for desktop, and will be evolving over time to better reflect that goal. The macos directory has now become a flutter create template, so is largely identical to what that command creates.

Building and Running

See the main project README.

To build without running, use flutter build macos/windows/linux rather than flutter run, as with a standard Flutter project.

Dart Differences from Flutter Template

The main.dart and pubspec.yaml have minor changes to support desktop:

debugDefaultTargetPlatformOverride is set to avoid 'Unknown platform' exceptions.
The font is explicitly set to Roboto, and Roboto is bundled via pubspec.yaml, to ensure that text displays on all platforms.

See the Flutter Application Requirements section of the Flutter page on desktop support for more information.

Adapting for Another Project

Since flutter create is not yet supported for Windows and Linux, the easiest way to try out desktop support with an existing Flutter application on those platforms is to copy the platform directories from this example; see below for details. For macOS, just run flutter create --macos . in your project.

Be sure to read the Flutter page on desktop support before trying to run an existing project on desktop, especially the Flutter Application Requirements section.

Copying the Desktop Runners

The 'linux' and 'windows' directories are self-contained, and can be copied to an existing Flutter project, enabling flutter run for those platforms.

Be aware that neither the API surface of the Flutter desktop libraries nor the interaction between the flutter tool and the platform directories is stable, and no attempt will be made to provide supported migration paths as things change. You should expect that every time you update Flutter you may have to delete your copies of the platform directories and re-copy them from an updated version of flutter-desktop-embedding.

Customizing the Runners

See Application Customization for premilinary documenation on modifying basic application information like name and icon.