Linux support and QT version
Posted: Sat 16. Jan 2021, 07:53
I'm not sure whether this belongs in bugs and problems or feature request, as it's kind of a bit of both. I've been a long-time user of FFDL on Linux and have found it very useful, particularly when I wanted to download only specific chapters of AO3 fics (:p to authors who create "fics" where every chapter's a different fandom ficlet!), as other fanfic downloaders didn't seem to offer that. But when it failed to work and I went to get the newest version, I was dismayed at the requirements.
The Linux version specifically requires QT 5.15, as stated on the website (and indeed the terminal will complain if one tries to run a version that is lower). However, for both Ubuntu and Mint, the latest stable versions of QT on each only go to 5.12. Mint (which is my native distro) doesn't have a newer less-stable version (it tends to be based off LTS releases only), so it's not even possible to upgrade to a version that can run FFDL. I would have to install the latest version of Ubuntu (a version that's only supported through July of this year) in a VM just to run FFDL! (While I do have some already-existing Windows VMs, they're older versions and don't have the service packs necessary to run the Windows version of FFDL, and I'm not sure that installing it with Wine on my Linux system would work all that well - but correct me if I'm wrong!)
Is there any way that the requirement for 5.15 can be lowered to an earlier version of Qt5 so that those of us on Long Term Support releases aren't unable to use FFDL without resorting to VMs for a different distro? I would be extremely grateful, and I'm sure I wouldn't be alone.
EDIT: I double-checked; the latest version of Ubuntu only goes to 5.14. When I asked for help on the Mint forums to find a way to upgrade, they said that it must have been compiled with KDE Neon Dev Stable instead of Kubuntu or Ubuntu, because the framework releases are generally even numbers; odd numbers are development builds. Is there a serious reason why this requires a development build (something few Linux users are likely to be running) or is it possible to downgrade the requirement to, say, 5.12, so that all the latest stable distros can run it?
The Linux version specifically requires QT 5.15, as stated on the website (and indeed the terminal will complain if one tries to run a version that is lower). However, for both Ubuntu and Mint, the latest stable versions of QT on each only go to 5.12. Mint (which is my native distro) doesn't have a newer less-stable version (it tends to be based off LTS releases only), so it's not even possible to upgrade to a version that can run FFDL. I would have to install the latest version of Ubuntu (a version that's only supported through July of this year) in a VM just to run FFDL! (While I do have some already-existing Windows VMs, they're older versions and don't have the service packs necessary to run the Windows version of FFDL, and I'm not sure that installing it with Wine on my Linux system would work all that well - but correct me if I'm wrong!)
Is there any way that the requirement for 5.15 can be lowered to an earlier version of Qt5 so that those of us on Long Term Support releases aren't unable to use FFDL without resorting to VMs for a different distro? I would be extremely grateful, and I'm sure I wouldn't be alone.
EDIT: I double-checked; the latest version of Ubuntu only goes to 5.14. When I asked for help on the Mint forums to find a way to upgrade, they said that it must have been compiled with KDE Neon Dev Stable instead of Kubuntu or Ubuntu, because the framework releases are generally even numbers; odd numbers are development builds. Is there a serious reason why this requires a development build (something few Linux users are likely to be running) or is it possible to downgrade the requirement to, say, 5.12, so that all the latest stable distros can run it?