Building and running on Windows

These steps follow from how the project is built, but nobody has tried them on Windows yet: if something does not work, please say what happened in the project's Issues.

#What to install

• Git for Windows (git-scm.com).
• Node.js 22, the version in .nvmrc (from nodejs.org, or with nvm-windows: nvm install 22 and nvm use 22).
• No compiler or Visual Studio build tools. The database module, better-sqlite3 13, ships ready N-API files for Windows x64 and ARM64 (win32-x64.node, win32-arm64.node), so nothing is compiled.

#Get the source

In PowerShell or the Git Bash window:

git clone <project address>.git nodewise-studio
cd nodewise-studio
npm ci

npm ci also downloads Electron for Windows.

#Build and start

npm run build
npm start

npm start builds and opens the app. Use it rather than npm run dev: that script sets a variable the Unix way (NODE_ENV=development electron .), which the Windows command shell does not understand.

#Where your data ends up

C:\Users\you\AppData\Roaming\nodewise-studio (%APPDATA%\nodewise-studio). To keep a test profile apart: npx electron . --user-data-dir=C:\Users\you\nodewise-test after npm run build.

Keys are encrypted by Windows (DPAPI) through Electron.

#An app folder you can start without npm

Electron Forge, the packaging tool the project uses, can make a folder with nodewise-studio.exe and everything it needs:

npm run build
npx electron-forge package

The folder appears under out\. Before you run this, open forge.config.js: one ignore rule keeps only the Linux database file (prebuilds/(?!linux-x64\.node$)). Let the Windows file through as well (for example (?!(linux-x64|win32-x64)\.node$)), or the packaged app cannot open its database. There is no Windows installer. The folder is out\NodeWise Studio-win32-x64. The project has no .ico file, so the program keeps Electron's own icon (untested).

#Update the source

git pull
npm ci
npm run build

#Remove everything

1. In the app: Settings ▸ Privacy ▸ Forget all keys and tokens.
2. Delete the project folder (nodewise-studio) and, if you made one, the packaged folder under out\.
3. Delete %APPDATA%\nodewise-studio.

#Known limits on this system

• Texts written for Linux. The keychain setting, its hints and Troubleshooting speak of GNOME Keyring and KWallet; on Windows, Electron uses DPAPI instead.
• File permissions. The app makes its files readable "by your user only" with Unix permissions. On Windows that does nothing, so the hints that promise it (for a key or token kept in the app folder) are not true there; the files get the usual permissions of your profile folder.
• No taskbar identity and no installer. The app sets no AppUserModelId and has no Squirrel or other installer handling, so pinning to the taskbar and notifications may behave oddly.
• --version and --help print nothing: a window app on Windows has no console attached.
• The package checks are Linux-only: scripts/smoke-linux-package.js, scripts/smoke-installed-deb.js and xvfb-run in the test commands. Run the end-to-end tests with npx playwright test without xvfb-run.
• Running as administrator is the Windows counterpart of running as root: do not.

#See also

• For developers
• Building from source
• Building and running on macOS