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Linux Deployment

Publishing​

Always publish XPF applications from the command line. Visual Studio publishing can produce incomplete output that is missing native libraries such as libSkiaSharp.so.

dotnet publish -r linux-x64 -c Release

For self-contained deployments:

dotnet publish -r linux-x64 -c Release --self-contained

For ARM64 devices:

dotnet publish -r linux-arm64 -c Release --self-contained

Runtime dependencies​

Ensure the following packages are installed on the target system.

Debian / Ubuntu​

sudo apt install libice6 libsm6 libfontconfig1 libgdiplus

Fedora​

sudo dnf install libICE libSM fontconfig libgdiplus

RHEL / CentOS / Rocky Linux​

sudo dnf install epel-release
sudo dnf install libICE libSM fontconfig libgdiplus

For WebView support, also install libwebkit2gtk-4.1-dev (Debian/Ubuntu) or webkit2gtk4.1-devel (Fedora/RHEL).

See Linux: Other Dependencies for details.

ReadyToRun​

ReadyToRun (R2R) compilation pre-compiles assemblies to native code, significantly reducing startup time. This is particularly beneficial on embedded Linux devices.

<PropertyGroup>
    <PublishReadyToRun>true</PublishReadyToRun>
</PropertyGroup>
dotnet publish -r linux-x64 -c Release --self-contained
note

ReadyToRun may change how native .so libraries are resolved. See Linux: Native Library Resolution for details.

Framework-dependent vs self-contained​

Framework-dependent (default): Requires .NET to be installed on the target machine. Produces a smaller deployment package.

Self-contained: Includes the .NET runtime. Larger package but no external dependencies beyond system libraries. Recommended for distribution to end users.

# Framework-dependent
dotnet publish -r linux-x64 -c Release

# Self-contained
dotnet publish -r linux-x64 -c Release --self-contained

Packaging formats​

AppImage​

AppImage bundles your application into a single executable file. Use tools like appimage-builder or package the published output into an AppImage manually.

Debian package (.deb)​

For Debian-based distributions, create a .deb package. Use dpkg-deb or a tool like dotnet-packaging:

dotnet tool install --global dotnet-deb
dotnet deb -r linux-x64 -c Release

RPM package​

For Fedora and RHEL-based distributions:

dotnet tool install --global dotnet-rpm
dotnet rpm -r linux-x64 -c Release

Flatpak and snap​

XPF applications can be distributed as Flatpak or Snap packages. Refer to each packaging system's documentation for bundling .NET applications.

CI/CD​

When building XPF applications in CI/CD pipelines:

  1. Add a NuGet.config with your license key (use CI secrets for the key value)
  2. Install required dependencies in the build environment
  3. Publish from the command line

Example GitHub Actions step:

- name: Publish for Linux
  run: dotnet publish -r linux-x64 -c Release --self-contained
  env:
    XpfLicenseKey: ${{ secrets.XPF_LICENSE_KEY }}

See Centralizing Multiple XPF Projects for using environment variables with license keys.

Debugging remote Linux targets​

For debugging XPF applications running on Linux from a Windows development machine, see Linux: Debugging.

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