macOS: build-tree .app is incomplete (web UI race, no apps.json) and Homebrew Boost fails to link ICU

[Optimiza]

Follow-up from #5511, where @martona asked for these to be filed separately since they are not caused by that PR. The code involved is current master (c48e50e). I hit them building #5511's branch and @martona's macos-latency branch, whose CMake files differ from master only by the ScreenCaptureKit framework and the source list; item 2 was re-run today against that build. They affect the .app that a plain cmake + ninja build leaves in the build tree, which cmake/targets/macos.cmake populates on purpose "for local runs".

Environment: macOS 26.7 on Apple M4, Apple clang 21.0.0, CMake 4.4.3, Ninja 1.13.2, Homebrew Boost 1.92.0, icu4c 78.3, Qt 6.11.2. Configured with cmake -B build -G Ninja -S . -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DBUILD_DOCS=OFF.

1. The web UI can be missing from the bundle (build race)

The bundle's resources are copied by a POST_BUILD step on sunshine (cmake/targets/macos.cmake#L18-L22), which copies ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/assets. That directory's web UI is written by web-ui, a separate ALL target (cmake/targets/common.cmake#L91). No add_dependencies links the two, so Ninja is free to link sunshine and run the copy before web-ui has written anything.

Seen on two fresh builds. On #5511's branch the copy ran 13 seconds before the web UI finished, and the bundle got 1 of 82 web files and no index.html, so the configuration UI served a blank page. On macos-latency the bundle got no web directory at all, against 75 files in build/assets/web. It is intermittent, so a rebuild can look fine.

Suggested fix: add_dependencies(sunshine web-ui) in the .app branch.

2. apps.json is not in the build-tree bundle, and Sunshine then exits with status 0

The same POST_BUILD step copies only ${CMAKE_BINARY_DIR}/assets. The macOS-specific assets, apps.json among them, are copied into the build tree only in the Homebrew branch (cmake/packaging/macos.cmake#L8) and otherwise only at install time (#L54).

On a first run, with no apps.json at file_apps yet, src/config.cpp#L1784-L1785 copies it from the bundle and the copy throws. Reproduced today with a fresh state directory:

Failed to apply config: filesystem error: in copy_file: No such file or directory ["<state>/apps.json"] ["../Resources/assets/apps.json"]

Two things make this harder to diagnose than it needs to be:

• The process exits with status 0, because the parse failure shares return 0 with the non-error early exits (src/main.cpp#L253-L255). A supervisor or a script sees a clean exit.
• The message only reaches stdout: the log file is initialised after the config parse (#L257), so sunshine.log is never created.

Suggested fix: have the POST_BUILD step also copy ${SUNSHINE_SOURCE_ASSETS_DIR}/macos/assets/ into the bundle's Resources/assets, as the install step does. Returning a non-zero status on a config failure would be a separate, small improvement.

3. Homebrew Boost fails to link: library 'icudata' not found

Since #5730 the build accepts any system Boost at or above the minimum instead of fetching one. With Homebrew's Boost 1.92, boost_locale brings icudata, icui18n and icuuc onto the link line by name, but Homebrew's icu4c is keg-only, so its lib directory is not in MACOS_LINK_DIRECTORIES (cmake/compile_definitions/macos.cmake#L13-L14). The final link fails:

ld: library 'icudata' not found

Workaround: configure with -DCMAKE_EXE_LINKER_FLAGS="-L$(brew --prefix icu4c)/lib". Separately, docs/building.md lists icu4c as "Optional, if boost is not installed", which is now the opposite of what happens when Boost is installed.

Suggested fix: add the icu4c prefix to the macOS link directories when it exists, or resolve ICU with find_package(ICU).

A correction to my #5511 report

Section 4 there said the built .app only runs from Contents/MacOS because SUNSHINE_ASSETS_DIR is relative to the working directory. That was wrong: on macOS main.cpp anchors the working directory to the executable's folder at startup (since #4759). I retested by starting the binary from another directory, and the web UI is served exactly as from Contents/MacOS. What I saw at the time was item 2 above, not a working-directory problem.

[ReenigneArcher]

When you static link boost, you need to then link against icu4c. If you use the system boost then you don't.

[Optimiza]

Thanks, confirmed. The ICU link comes from the static default: BOOST_USE_STATIC is ON (cmake/prep/options.cmake#L29), and Homebrew's static boost_locale config names icudata, icui18n and icuuc bare, while icu4c is keg-only. Configuring the same tree with -DBOOST_USE_STATIC=OFF and no linker flag builds and links: the link line has no -licu*, and otool -L shows the binary loading Homebrew's Boost dylibs, which reference ICU by absolute path. So item 3 is not a defect in the system Boost path; I'm withdrawing it.

What still reads the other way is docs/building.md#L123, which lists icu4c as "Optional, if boost is not installed". With the static default it is needed when Boost is installed. Either that comment, or a note that Homebrew users can pass -DBOOST_USE_STATIC=OFF, would have saved me the detour.

Items 1 and 2 still stand on current master (05350c05): nothing orders web-ui before the POST_BUILD copy in cmake/targets/macos.cmake#L18-L22, and the macOS assets, apps.json among them, reach the build tree only in the Homebrew branch of cmake/packaging/macos.cmake#L3-L9.

A note on how this is written: I run these tests automated with an AI assistant, and I use it to write in English and to carry the log lines over without copying them by hand. The runs, the verdicts and the decision to post are mine.