building.md

Build instructions

• Visual Studio 2017
• Xcode 9
• GYP/CMake on GNU/Linux

Customize application

Before publish a custom version of Telegram Desktop application you need to get new api_id and api_hash values. To do that you need to follow instructions at the page: Obtaining api_id. See also the thread: GitHub: "internal server error" on login.

So, after obtaining new values of api_id and api_hash you need to create a new directory next to your tdesktop folder with the name: TelegramPrivate. And place a new file custom_api_id.h there with the content:

static const int32 ApiId = [api_id];
static const char *ApiHash = "[api_hash]";

And please check that we set CUSTOM_API_ID define at the Telegram.gyp file.

Also please note that we do not need to place the custom_api_id.h to Git. It is because we should keep api_id and api_hash values private.

Autoupdates

If you want to support autoupdates feature you should do the following things:

1. Change autoupdate url
2. Generate your own UpdatesPublicKey and UpdatesPublicAlphaKey RSA keys
3. Build Packer project
4. Make update packages with Packer utility
5. Setup your own server for maintaining update packages

Changing autoupdate url

The current autoupdate url is https://updates.bettergram.io. It is hard coded at the readAutoupdatePrefixRaw() method from localstorage.cpp file. In order to temporary change this value you can create <working-directory>/tdata/prefix file with new autoupdate url value. So, if this file exists and does not empty the application uses the file content as an autoupdate url prefix.

Generating UpdatesPublicKey and UpdatesPublicAlphaKey

In order to be able to use your own updates you should replace UpdatesPublicKey and UpdatesPublicAlphaKey variables at the config.h and packer.cpp files. To do that you need to generate two RSA keys by using the following commands:

$ openssl genrsa -passout stdin -out bettergram-updates-key-private.pem 1024
$ openssl rsa -in bettergram-updates-key-private.pem -RSAPublicKey_out -out bettergram-updates-key-public.pem

$ openssl genrsa -passout stdin -out bettergram-updates-alpha-key-private.pem 1024
$ openssl rsa -in bettergram-updates-alpha-key-private.pem -RSAPublicKey_out -out bettergram-updates-alpha-key-public.pem

Please do not forget to assign strong passwords for both keys (you should type them right after you typed commands to generate private keys). After you will have generated them you should replace UpdatesPublicKey and UpdatesPublicAlphaKey variables at the config.h and packer.cpp files with contents of the *-public.pem keys and store private keys in safe place and do NOT publish it or store in git.

Making update packages

There is Packer project in the Bettergram solution. In order to make update packages you should do the following steps:

1. Add packer_private.h file to the TelegramPrivate directory. This file should contain PrivateKey and PrivateAlphaKey variables:

   const char *PrivateKey = "\
   -----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY-----\n\
   ...
   -----END RSA PRIVATE KEY-----\
   ";
   
   const char *PrivateAlphaKey = "\
   -----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY-----\n\
   ...
   -----END RSA PRIVATE KEY-----\
   ";
   

2. Add beta_private.h file to the TelegramPrivate directory. This file should contain BetaPrivateKey variable:

   const char *BetaPrivateKey = "\
   -----BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY-----\n\
   ...
   -----END RSA PRIVATE KEY-----\
   ";
   

   I assume this value may be equal to PrivateAlphaKey variable.

3. Build the Packer project for each platform (Linux, macOS and Windows)

4. Run Packer utility:

   $ ./Packer -path Bettergram -path Updater -version 1003014
   

   You should use actual Bettergram version number instead of 1003014. The Packer should generate one file that will contain all files from -path arguments, something like this: tlinuxupd1003014

Build new release

In order to build new release you should do the following steps:

1. Change Version at the Telegram/Resources/uwp/AppX/AppxManifest.xml file
2. Change FILEVERSION, PRODUCTVERSION, FileVersion and ProductVersion at the Telegram/Resources/winrc/Telegram.rc file
3. Change FILEVERSION, PRODUCTVERSION, FileVersion and ProductVersion at the Telegram/Resources/winrc/Updater.rc file
4. Change BETA_VERSION_MACRO to 0ULL, AppVersion, AppVersionStr at Telegram/SourceFiles/core/version.h file
5. Change BetaVersion to 0, AppVersion, AppVersionStrMajor, AppVersionStrSmall and AppVersionStr at Telegram/build/version file
6. Add description of the new version into bettergram_changelog.txt file
7. Add new commit with the description from bettergram_changelog.txt file
8. Add new tag with the version to git

As an example you can see the Version 1.3.13. commit. Or you can use set_version.bat and set_version.sh files.