Screen Recorder (Flutter Linux)

Wayland screen recorder with PipeWire capture, FFmpeg encoding, and Linux desktop packaging.

Features

• Screen recording on Linux/Wayland via PipeWire portal flow.
• Optional audio recording with automatic recommended source detection.
• Resolution presets from native display down to 480p.
• No-upscale behavior for small rectangular capture regions.
• FPS, save path, audio toggle, and resolution settings in-app.
• Linux release packaging with installer, desktop entry, and preflight scripts.
• Manual GitHub workflows for package-only and full release publishing.

Recommended Audio Stack Setup

For the best audio capture reliability, use a modern PipeWire-based user stack.

• Run screen-recorder-preflight after install.
• This configures distro-specific dependencies/services for PipeWire + portals.
• It also helps auto-detect and persist the recommended monitor audio source.

If your distro already uses PipeWire, running preflight is still recommended to verify required services and portal integration.

Required Dependencies (Manual Local Build)

If you build and run locally (without the packaged installer), install these first:

• Build tooling: clang, cmake, ninja, pkg-config
• Native build headers/libs: GTK3, PipeWire 0.3, SPA 0.2
• Runtime encoder: ffmpeg (required by recorder process)
• Runtime services: pipewire, wireplumber, xdg-desktop-portal and a portal backend for your desktop

Install commands:

Ubuntu/Debian:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install -y \
  clang cmake ninja-build pkg-config libgtk-3-dev \
  libpipewire-0.3-dev libspa-0.2-dev \
  pipewire pipewire-pulse wireplumber \
  xdg-desktop-portal xdg-desktop-portal-gtk \
  pulseaudio-utils ffmpeg

Fedora/RHEL:

sudo dnf -y install \
  clang cmake ninja-build pkg-config gtk3-devel \
  pipewire-devel pipewire-jack-audio-connection-kit-devel \
  pipewire pipewire-alsa pipewire-pulseaudio wireplumber \
  xdg-desktop-portal xdg-desktop-portal-gtk pulseaudio-utils
sudo dnf -y install ffmpeg || sudo dnf -y install ffmpeg-free

Arch/EndeavourOS:

sudo pacman -S --needed \
  clang cmake ninja pkgconf gtk3 pipewire libpipewire wireplumber \
  xdg-desktop-portal ffmpeg

Then run:

flutter pub get
flutter build linux --release

Local Development

From flutter_app/:

flutter pub get
flutter run -d linux

Checks:

flutter analyze
flutter build linux --debug

Local Release Packaging

Build release and create distributable tarball:

flutter build linux --release
./packaging/create_release_bundle.sh 1.0.0

Output:

• dist/screen-recorder-1.0.0-linux-x64.tar.gz
• dist/screen-recorder-1.0.0-linux-x64.tar.gz.sha256

The tarball includes:

• app/ (Flutter Linux bundle)
• install.sh
• bin/screen-recorder-preflight
• bin/screen-recorder-detect-audio-device
• preflight/setup_debian_ubuntu.sh
• preflight/setup_fedora_rhel.sh
• preflight/setup_arch_endeavouros.sh
• desktop/screen-recorder.desktop

Install on a Target Machine

Extract the tarball and run:

cd screen-recorder-1.0.0
./install.sh

What installer does:

• Copies app to /opt/screen-recorder
• Adds commands to PATH via /usr/local/bin/:
  • screen-recorder
  • screen-recorder-preflight
  • screen-recorder-detect-audio-device
• Copies desktop entry to ~/.local/share/applications/screen-recorder.desktop
• Runs distro preflight by default

Skip preflight during install:

RUN_PREFLIGHT=0 ./install.sh

Run preflight manually later:

screen-recorder-preflight

Audio Device Selection

At startup, app resolves recommended audio source in this order:

1. SCREEN_RECORDER_AUDIO_DEVICE env var
2. ~/.config/screen-recorder/audio-device
3. pactl default sink monitor
4. First monitor source from pactl list short sources
5. default

You can inspect current auto-detected source:

screen-recorder-detect-audio-device

GitHub Actions (Manual Only)

Workflows are intentionally manual (workflow_dispatch):

• .github/workflows/linux-package.yml
• .github/workflows/linux-release.yml

Package Artifact Only

Run Linux Package workflow and provide version.

Publish GitHub Release

Run Linux Release workflow and provide:

• version (without v, for example 1.0.0)
• create_release=true

It builds Linux release bundle, uploads artifacts, and creates tag/release v<version>.