Obtainium/docs/DEVELOPER_GUIDE.md

Obtainium Developer Guide

Obtainium is a Flutter (Android-first) app that installs and updates Android apps directly from their release sources (GitHub, GitLab, F-Droid repos, HTML pages, APK hosts, etc.). It scrapes/queries each source for the latest release, downloads the APK (or split-APK container / archive), and installs it — optionally silently in the background.

This guide explains the architecture, the major subsystems, and the conventions you should follow when working in this codebase.

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1. Tech stack & entry points

Concern	Choice
UI	Flutter, Material 3 "Expressive" (useMaterial3: true)
State management	provider (ChangeNotifier)
Persistence	One JSON file per app on disk + SharedPreferences for settings + flutter_secure_storage for credentials + sqflite for logs
Localization	easy_localization (assets/translations/*.json, key-based tr() / plural())
Background work	background_fetch (headless) and flutter_foreground_task (FG service)
Installation	Installer abstraction (StockInstaller / ShizukuInstaller / ExternalInstaller) backed by android_package_installer, shizuku_apk_installer, android_intent_plus

Entry point: lib/main.dart

• main() bootstraps: PlatformDispatcher.onError handler (catches unhandled platform errors and logs them), trusted certs, date formatting, EasyLocalization, edge-to-edge system UI (SDK ≥ 29), notifications, then runApp inside a MultiProvider.
• A custom ErrorWidget.builder is installed so that rendering crashes show a user-friendly "close" screen rather than the default Flutter red screen.
• Providers are created in main() (not inside the widget tree) so background tasks can use the same instances: AppsProvider, SettingsProvider, NotificationsProvider, LogsProvider, SourceProvider. Read them everywhere via context.read/watch/select.
• buildObtainiumTheme() builds the app-wide Material 3 Expressive ThemeData once; all shape/motion character lives here (squircle RoundedSuperellipseBorder cards/dialogs, StadiumBorder pill buttons, emphasized page transitions, Material 3 expressive sliders/progress indicators). Do not re-style these per widget — extend the theme.
• _ObtainiumState runs side effects in initState (post-frame), not in build(): permission requests, foreground/background service management (_manageServices), first-run handling (_handleFirstRun), and the launch-by-notification check. Each is guarded so it runs once; a SettingsProvider listener re-runs service/first-run logic on settings changes. Follow this pattern — never trigger navigation, dialogs, or service starts directly from build().
• bgUpdateCheck() is the headless background entry point (see §6).

There is also main_fdroid.dart for the F-Droid build flavour (sets isFdroidBuild = true).

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2. Directory layout

lib/
├─ main.dart                      App bootstrap, FG/BG service control
├─ main_fdroid.dart               F-Droid flavour entry point
├─ theme.dart                     Material 3 Expressive ThemeData builder, shapes + motion tokens
├─ custom_errors.dart             ObtainiumError + typed errors with codes/stacks/data
├─ pages/                         Full screens (each is a StatefulWidget in a single file)
│  ├─ home.dart
│  ├─ apps.dart
│  ├─ app.dart
│  ├─ add_app.dart
│  ├─ settings.dart
│  └─ import_export.dart
├─ components/                    All UI: design tokens, form engine, feature widgets, dialogs
│  ├─ generated_form_model.dart   Form data model (pure Dart)
│  ├─ generated_form_renderer.dart Form widget rendering (includes modal/dialog wrapper)
│  ├─ ui_widgets.dart             AppIcon, EmptyState, ConnectedCard, LinkText, CustomAppBar, showMessage/showError, positional tile helpers
│  ├─ settings_widgets.dart       SettingsGroup, SettingsTile, etc.
│  ├─ app_list_tile.dart          AppListTile, AppListBuilder, changelog helpers
│  ├─ app_detail_widgets.dart     AppInfoDialog, AppFilePicker
│  └─ category_editor.dart        Category management UI
├─ providers/                     State, business logic, services, models
│  ├─ apps_provider.dart          Core AppsProvider + download primitives + TranslationLoader + NativeFeatures
│  ├─ apps_provider_*.dart        Lifecycle, updates, install, import/export extensions
│  ├─ source_provider.dart        Immutable App model + TypedSettings + AppSource + SourceProvider + HttpService + VersionService + legacy JSON migrations
│  ├─ settings_provider.dart      Typed getters/setters over SharedPreferences
│  ├─ logs_provider.dart          sqflite-backed logs + Logger/AppLogger
│  ├─ notifications_provider.dart Local notifications
│  └─ external_install_bridge.dart External installer discovery + content-URI conversion
├─ installers/                    Install strategy abstraction
│  ├─ installer.dart              Abstract Installer + InstallResult
│  ├─ stock_installer.dart        AndroidPackageInstaller
│  ├─ shizuku_installer.dart      Shizuku/Dhizuku/Sui
│  └─ external_installer.dart     Third-party installer hand-off
└─ app_sources/                  One file per supported source (28 sources + githubstars)

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3. State management & data model

Providers

State lives in ChangeNotifier providers exposed through provider. Read providers narrowly to avoid rebuild amplification:

• context.read<T>() — one-off access (event handlers, initState).
• context.select<T, R>((p) => p.field) — rebuild only when field changes.
• context.watch<T>() — rebuild on any change. Avoid for big providers like AppsProvider; prefer select. (Several perf fixes in this codebase were exactly "replace watch with select".)

The App model (source_provider.dart)

App is the persisted unit. Key fields: id (Android package id or a temp hash), url, author, name, installedVersion, latestVersion, apkUrls (List<MapEntry<name, url>>), preferredApkIndex, additionalSettings (Map<String, dynamic> — per-app source options), categories, pinned, overrideSource, pendingRepoRenameUrl, and a compatVersion stamp.

• App.toJson() / App.fromJson() serialize to/from disk.
• App.fromJson() runs appJSONCompatibilityModifiers() — a long chain of one-time schema migrations (legacy → current). It is wrapped in try/catch so a single bad migration can't brick loading. The compatVersion constant (currentAppJSONCompatVersion) gates the one-time legacy migrations so already-migrated apps skip them; default-setting reconciliation still always runs.
• App is immutable — use App.copyWith(...) to create a modified copy instead of mutating fields directly.

AppInMemory (apps_provider.dart)

Runtime wrapper around App that also holds downloadProgress (via a ValueNotifier for efficient per-tile updates), installedInfo (PackageInfo from the OS), and the cached icon bytes. AppsProvider.apps is a Map<String, AppInMemory> kept in sync with disk.

Persistence rules (apps_provider_lifecycle.dart)

• Each app is a JSON file in app_data/<id>.json. Writes go to <id>.json.tmp then renameSync — atomic write, never partially-written files (#2089).
• Corrupt JSON on load is renamed to *.corrupt and skipped, not fatal.
• loadApps() is serialized via a Completer lock (waitForAppsToLoad()), not a busy-wait. It batches all parsing then notifies once.
• saveApps() reconciles install status (unless attemptToCorrectInstallStatus: false), updates in-memory state, notifies once, and schedules a debounced auto-export.
• Icons are cached as PNG in an icons/ cache dir and deleted when an app is uninstalled.

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4. The Source system (the core extensibility model)

This is the heart of Obtainium. To add support for a new app source, add one file in lib/app_sources/ and register it in SourceProvider._buildSources().

AppSource (abstract, in source_provider.dart)

A source is a subclass of AppSource. The base class is effectively immutable after construction (all config is set in the subclass constructor body — a few sources override name after super()), which is why instances can be cached and shared.

Configure behaviour by setting fields in the constructor:

class MySource extends AppSource {
  MySource() {
    hosts = ['example.com'];          // domains this source matches
    name = 'MySource';                // set automatically in super() as runtimeType, can be overridden
    canSearch = true;                 // supports search()
    appIdInferIsOptional = true;
    showReleaseDateAsVersionToggle = true;
    allowIncludeZips = true;
    allowIncludeTarballs = true;
    // Per-app options shown in the add/edit form:
    additionalSourceAppSpecificSettingFormItems = [ [GeneratedFormSwitch(...)], ... ];
    // Source-wide options stored in SettingsProvider (e.g. an API token):
    sourceConfigSettingFormItems = [ GeneratedFormTextField('example-creds', ...) ];
  }
}

Override the contract methods you need:

Method	Responsibility
sourceSpecificStandardizeURL(url, {forSelection})	Validate + normalize a URL to a canonical form, or throw InvalidURLError. Used for both selection and storage.
getLatestAPKDetails(standardUrl, additionalSettings)	The main job: fetch the latest release and return APKDetails(version, apkUrls, names, releaseDate, changeLog, allAssetUrls).
tryInferringAppId(standardUrl, {...})	Best-effort detect the Android package id (optional).
search(query, {querySettings})	Return {url: [name, description]} (only if canSearch).
getRequestHeaders(...)	Provide auth/format headers (defined on AppSource).
getSourceNote()	Markdown note shown in the UI (e.g. "add a token to avoid rate limits").
changeLogPageFromStandardUrl(url)	URL of the human-readable changelog/releases page. Set changeLogPageIsStandardUrl = true in the constructor instead of overriding this if the changelog page is the same as the standard URL.
postProcessApp(app)	Transform the App object after all other processing (e.g. F-Droid repos update the URL with an appId query param).

Helpers you should reuse (don't reinvent)

• standardizeUrlWithRegex(url, subdomainPrefix:, pathPattern:) — the common "regex against host + path, return match or throw InvalidURLError" pattern. Most sources should adopt this helper rather than inlining their own regex construction.
• AppSource.isApkOrContainerFile(name, {includeArchives, includeTarballs}) — the single source of truth for "is this file an installable container?". Recognizes .apk/.xapk/.apkm/.apks (+ optional .zip and tarballs). Use it instead of hand-rolling .endsWith('.apk'), which historically missed split-APK formats.
• sourceRequest(...) — the base HTTP method. It merges source config + per-app settings, applies header/prefetch modifiers, follows redirects with a cap, and always closes the HttpClient. Use this, not a raw http.get.
• filterApks, filterApksByArch, extractVersion, findStandardFormatsForVersion, getLinksFromParsedHTML, getApkUrlsFromUrls.

SourceProvider (the service)

• Singleton (factory SourceProvider() => _instance). All SourceProvider() calls return the same object.
• sources is a cached, shared, read-only list built lazily by _buildSources(). Because sources are immutable, this is safe. The only mutating path is getSource(url, overrideSource: ...), which builds a throwaway fresh instance so the cache stays pristine.
• getSource(url): first tries host-regex matching against sources with hosts, then falls back to host-less sources via sourceSpecificStandardizeURL — HTML() is always last as the catch-all. Match errors are logged, never swallowed silently.
• getApp(...): orchestrates getLatestAPKDetails → version extraction → APK filtering → arch filtering → builds the final App. This is where versionExtractionRegEx, releaseDateAsVersion, apkFilterRegEx, autoApkFilterByArch, app-id inference, and overrideSource are all applied.

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5. UI layer & component conventions

Navigation shell (pages/home.dart)

HomePage is an adaptive shell:

• Bottom NavigationBar on compact screens, NavigationRail on wide (width >= 600) / TV layouts.
• Two-pane list+detail on very wide screens (width >= 900) for the Apps tab.
• Single-pane content on wide screens is width-capped at 720px and centered.
• Update count is shown as a live Badge driven by context.select<AppsProvider>(...findAppIdsWithPendingUpdates...).
• Only two tabs (Apps, Settings). "Add App" is a FAB; Import/Export are folded into the Add App page and Settings respectively.

Reusable components (lib/components/)

Prefer these over bespoke widgets:

• theme.dart — positionalTileShape({isFirst, isLast}), StadiumBorder, ExpressiveMotion.{emphasized, short, medium} motion tokens. All shape and motion characters are defined here.
• ui_widgets.dart —
  • AppIcon (squircle icon with Obtainium glyph fallback, excluded from semantics),
  • ActionListTile (icon + label ListTile with optional auto-pop),
  • ConnectedCard (single tonal card; isFirst/isLast round outer corners so runs read as one block),
  • EmptyState (centered icon + caption for empty/loading/no-results),
  • LinkText (tappable external link, Semantics(link: true)),
  • HighlightableButton (FilledButton when "highlight touch targets" is on, else TextButton),
  • CustomAppBar (wrapping SliverAppBar.large),
  • copyToClipboard(context, text), showConfirmDialog(...) -> Future<bool>, showHelpDialog(context, title, content),
  • showMessage(dynamic e, BuildContext, {bool isError}) — logs via LogsProvider and shows a snackbar (informational) or dialog (unexpected errors).
  • showError(dynamic e, BuildContext) — convenience wrapper around showMessage with isError: true.
• settings_widgets.dart — SettingsGroup, SettingsSectionHeader, SettingsTile, SettingsToggleRow, and shapeSettingsTiles() which auto-connects consecutive tiles.
• generated_form_renderer.dart — GeneratedForm widget (renders form items) and GeneratedFormModal (a GeneratedForm inside an AlertDialog; the standard way to ask the user for structured input or confirmation).
• app_list_tile.dart — AppListTile (the app row: swipe-to-install/remove, category gradient, pin/select states, download progress), AppIconWidget, DownloadProgressTrailing, and changelog dialog helpers (showChangeLogDialog, getChangeLogFn).
• app_detail_widgets.dart — AppInfoDialog (read-only app summary: icon, name, author, URL, version, last-check), AppFilePicker (choose among multiple APK/asset URLs), APKOriginWarningDialog (with "don't show again").
• category_editor.dart — showCategoryEditor(), CategorySelector, CategoryManager.

The LogsDialog widget lives in pages/settings.dart since it's only used from the settings page.

The form engine (generated_form_model.dart)

Forms throughout the app (per-app settings, source config, search filters, confirm dialogs) are data-driven. You describe fields as List<List<GeneratedFormItem>> (rows of fields) and GeneratedForm (in generated_form_renderer.dart) renders + validates them:

• GeneratedFormTextField (with optional autocomplete, password, multi-line, validators, help URL/dialog)
• GeneratedFormSwitch (bool; supports disabled)
• GeneratedFormDropdown (opts, disabledOptKeys)
• GeneratedFormSubForm (nested repeatable groups, e.g. HTML intermediate links)

It reports changes via onValueChanges(values, valid, isBuilding). Each GeneratedFormItem has ensureType() (coerce stored value) and clone() (deep copy). Form items owned by a source are cloned (cloneFormItems) before defaults are pre-filled, because sources are cached/shared and in-place mutation would leak across apps. tileMode: true renders fields in the connected-tile settings aesthetic.

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6. Background updates & installation

Background check (bgUpdateCheck in apps_provider.dart)

Runs headless (no widget tree) via background_fetch or the foreground service. It:

1. Loads translations manually (no BuildContext available).
2. Bails early on no network / restrictions (Wi-Fi-only, charging-only) / too-soon.
3. Update mode (toCheck non-empty): checks updates, splits results into notify-only vs silently-installable, sends grouped notifications, and schedules retries that actually await the retry delay so rate-limited hosts aren't hammered.
4. Install mode (toCheck empty): downloads + silently installs pending updates; Obtainium itself is always moved to install last.
5. Publishes saves via a broadcast StreamController<void> so the foreground instance can detect background writes and reload automatically. Errors during background tasks are caught and logged rather than crashing the headless process.

Update checking (apps_provider_updates.dart)

• fetchUpdate(appId) fetches new metadata without saving; checkUpdate(appId) fetches and saves.
• checkUpdates() processes app IDs in bounded chunks (max 8 concurrent) and persists each chunk with a single saveApps() call. This is the key fix for the pull-to-refresh UI freeze: it caps concurrent network/parse load and cuts rebuilds from O(N) to O(N/chunk).

Installation (apps_provider_install.dart)

AppsProviderInstall extension handles the full pipeline:

• downloadApp(...) → file or DownloadedDir (xAPK/zip/tarball get extracted).
• Tarballs are extracted from supported compression formats (gzip, bzip2, xz) into split APK directories.
• installApk / installApkDir select the installer strategy (StockInstaller, ShizukuInstaller, or ExternalInstaller) based on user settings. See lib/installers/.
• canInstallSilently(app) decides whether a background silent install is allowed.
• moveObbFile uses SAF (shared_storage) on Android 11+, direct file access on older versions.
• downloadAndInstallLatestApps(...) is the orchestrator used by both UI and background.
• Installs require the foreground (waitForUserToReturnToForeground); the swipe-to-install tile stays locked from download start through install handoff.

Credentials

Source credentials (e.g. github-creds, gitlab-creds) are stored in flutter_secure_storage (encrypted), with automatic migration from any plaintext SharedPreferences values left over from older versions.

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7. Conventions & patterns to follow

State / lifecycle

• Side effects go in initState/post-frame callbacks/listeners, never in build().
• Prefer context.select over context.watch for large providers.
• Guard every setState/Navigator/ScaffoldMessenger call after an await with if (!context.mounted) return; (preferred over bare mounted in Flutter ≥ 3.7).
• Deep-copy an App before mutating (App.copyWith(...)); never mutate provider-owned objects in place.

Errors / robustness

• Throw ObtainiumError (or a typed subclass in custom_errors.dart) rather than raw Strings. Key types: RateLimitError (with remaining minutes), InvalidURLError, NoReleasesError, NoAPKError, NoVersionError, DowngradeError, InstallError, IDChangedError, RepositoryRenamedError.
• Errors use deferred localization: the code is set at construction time (e.g. code: 'NO_RELEASES') but the user-facing message is resolved via localizeErrorCode() only when message is read. This lets errors be created in background tasks where no translation context is available.
• Use rethrowOrWrapError(e) (from custom_errors.dart) in every source's try/catch block to wrap unexpected errors as ObtainiumError with stack traces.
• Use showError(dynamic e, BuildContext) for unexpected/error-level messages (shows a dialog) and showMessage(...) for informational messages (shows a snackbar).
• MultiAppMultiError bundles multiple per-app errors for batch operations; use errors.add(appId, error, appName:) to collect them.
• Never silently swallow exceptions. Log them via LogsProvider().add(...) or the Logger/AppLogger abstraction (preferred for structured logging: logger.debug(), logger.info(), logger.warn(), logger.error()).

Categories & colour coding

• Categories are stored as Map<String, int> (name → ARGB colour) in shared preferences.
• generateRandomLightColor() in generated_form_renderer.dart produces pastel colours using the HSLuv colour space with golden-angle hue distribution.
• addMissingCategories() in apps_provider_lifecycle.dart reconciles any categories found in stored apps but missing from the settings map.

Resources

• Always close() an HttpClient/IOClient (use finally). Dispose TextEditingControllers, stream subscriptions, and timers.

UI / a11y / i18n

• Use the theme; don't hardcode colors/shapes. Pull colors from Theme.of(context).colorScheme.
• All user-facing strings go through tr() / plural() with a key in every assets/translations/*.json (at minimum en.json).
• Reuse ConnectedCard/SettingsTile/positionalTileShape for grouped tiles instead of hand-rolling Material(shape: ...).

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8. Building, running, testing

flutter pub get
flutter analyze        # must be clean
dart format --set-exit-if-changed .
flutter run            # default flavour
flutter build apk --flavor normal   # or use ./build.sh

• Flavours: normal (default, lib/main.dart) and fdroid (lib/main_fdroid.dart, reproducible-build friendly).
• Several dependencies are git-pinned to commit SHAs in pubspec.yaml (android_package_installer, android_package_manager, shared_storage, shizuku_apk_installer, android_system_font) — keep them pinned; don't switch to ref: main/ref: master.
• sign.sh reads the keystore password from an env var and locates apksigner robustly; build.sh / docker/Dockerfile handle reproducible/CI builds.
• Note: The project currently lacks automated tests. Run flutter analyze and dart format --set-exit-if-changed . locally before opening a PR.

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9. Where to start for common tasks

Task	Start here
Add a new app source	New file in app_sources/, register in SourceProvider._buildSources()
Add a per-app option	The source's additionalSourceAppSpecificSettingFormItems (or the base _commonAppSettingFormItems accessed via combinedAppSpecificSettingFormItems)
Add a global setting	A typed getter/setter in settings_provider.dart + a corresponding widget in settings.dart (e.g. SettingsToggleRow, GeneratedFormDropdown). Settings are organized into sections via _buildUpdatesSection() and _buildAppearanceSection() — add your control to the appropriate section.
Change update logic	apps_provider_updates.dart (foreground) / bgUpdateCheck (background)
Change install behaviour	apps_provider_install.dart
Add a reusable widget/dialog	components/ui_widgets.dart (or a dedicated component file)
Theme/shape/motion tweaks	buildObtainiumTheme() in lib/theme.dart (positionalTileShape, StadiumBorder, ExpressiveMotion tokens all live here)