Image archive (all platforms)

format = "image" builds no installer: the run-in-place image tree itself is the deliverable, archived into appdist/<target>/dist/:

• <name>-<version>-<target>.zip — for Windows targets.

• <name>-<version>-<target>.tar.gz — for Linux and macOS targets (tar preserves the symlinks and permissions the image needs on those OSes).

The archive contains a single top-level directory <name>-<version>/ holding the image, so extracting it doesn’t scatter files. Unlike the other formats, image is available on every platform value.

Use it when you don’t want an installer — for example to deploy the tree with your own tooling, unpack it into a container, or wrap it in a packaging system pyappdist doesn’t produce.

Build requirements

The same as building the image for that platform. Launchers follow the target OS: a Windows target compiles the usual .exe launchers (MSVC build tools required, unless no-launcher is set), while Linux/macOS targets get the same relocatable shell-wrapper launchers as the .run installer (no toolchain). The Windows launcher .exe files are code-signed when PYAPPDIST_SIGN_CMD is set.

Configuration

no-launcher

true skips launcher generation entirely, so the archive contains just the installed tree (default false). Only valid with format = "image".

[[tool.pyappdist.targets]]
name = "windows-zip"
platform = "windows-x86_64"
format = "image"

[[tool.pyappdist.targets]]
name = "linux-tar"
platform = "linux-x86_64"
format = "image"
# no-launcher = true   # archive the bare tree, without launchers

Run behavior

Extract the archive anywhere and run the launchers from the extracted directory — they locate the bundled interpreter relative to themselves, so no installation step is needed. Nothing is registered with the OS (no shortcuts, no .desktop entries, no uninstaller); integration and updates are the app’s own responsibility.