Flutter App Development in Container

Flutter App Development in Container

Table of Contents

Android development using flutter inside container

I am using

1. Get a Container Image.

$ podman pull docker.io/ubuntu

2. Create a Container

  1. Volumes

    1. We need to configure our container to user Display screen of host.
        Host's /tmp/.X11-unix map it to Container's /tmp/.X11-unix
    1. Next, adding volume for KVM, this is used to let emulator run inside a container.
        Host's /dev/kvm map to Container's /dev/kvm
    1. Lastly, add a dir for file transfer between Host and Container.
        Host's /home/dir/dir map to Container's /home/dir/dir

  2. Variables

    1. For GUI apps to pop up in Host Screen
    DISPLAY = :1

  3. Attach the container

    $ podman start flutty-flutter
$ podman attach flutty-flutter

apt update && apt upgrade && apt install git nano wget gpg

3. Create a non root user. Refer to my blog here.

4. Install a text editor, by this we can test if Container can access the Display server of Host machine.

Install on Debian / Ubuntu (deb package):

Add the GPG key of the repository:

    wget -qO - https://gitlab.com/paulcarroty/vscodium-deb-rpm-repo/raw/master/pub.gpg \
        | gpg --dearmor \
        |  dd   of=/usr/share/keyrings/vscodium-archive-keyring.gpg

Add the repository:

    echo 'deb [ signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/vscodium-archive-keyring.gpg ] https://download.vscodium.com/debs     vscodium main' \
        |  tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/vscodium.list

Update then install vscodium (if you want vscodium-insiders, then replace codium by codium-insiders):

     apt update &&  apt install codium

5. Installing Flutter.

  1. Download Flutter from https://docs.flutter.dev/get-started/install/linux.

  2. Copy downloaded zip file to shared directory between Host and Container.

  3. Extract he zip file to “/opt/” inside container.

    $ tar -xf flutterfile.zipfile -C /opt/

  4. Open .bashrc file of root user and add path to flutter.

    $ nano ~/bashrc
##
export PATH="$PATH:/opt/flutter/bin/"

  5. Run

    $   flutter doctor

You can ignore the warning about n ot using flutter in sudo mode.

  1. Disable the telemetry
    $ flutter --disable-telemetry

6. Now use Flutter and Vscodium together.

  1. Create Flutter app

    $ flutter create newapp

  2. cd into “newapp”

  3. Open “newapp” in Vscodium

    $ codium .
You are trying to start VSCodium as a super user which isn't recommended. If this was intended, please add the  argument `--no-sandbox` and specify an alternate user data directory using the `--user-data-dir` argument.


root@840268e3177# codium --no-sandbox --user-data-dir .

  4. Vscodium » Extenstions » Search for “Flutter” » Install (It will install Flutter and Dart).

  5. Disable Dart’s Telemetry too

    $ dart --disable-telemetry

7. If you want you can install a beautiful shell refer to my older post about zsh.

Extension

9. After installing Flutter you need to be able to install the apps into the emulator

The Android studio gives “Android” in /home/

So I copied the Android dir to this container’s /home/

Ran “flutter doctor” it suggested to to

flutter config --android-sdk add your path here "/home/Android/Sdk"

Then flutter suggested to go to sdbmanger and do

Run path/to/sdkmanager --install "cmdline-tools;latest"

Path to sdkmanager: /home/Android/Sdk/tools/bin/

Then sdkmanaget needs java to be installed

Install java

sudo apt install default-jdk
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