Okay, I’ve worked on this a bit, and have managed to make some minor improvements, but there are still some problems I can’t work out.
What’s happening is that the Inform7 flatpak has been built with the default minimum permissons. One of the stated aims of Flatpak is to improve security between applications, so it’s not surprising that these are pretty restrictive.
What we have to do to render the flatpak usable is to override the default permissions using the terminal.
so, open a terminal window and type:
sudo flatpak override com.inform7.IDE --filesystem=home:create
You’ll be asked for your user password and then the ability to create folders will be permitted.
You’ll now be able to create a new project folder (within your home directory) and I7 will be able to save your new project to it.
If you want to keep your I7 projects somewhere other than your home directory, then substitute “host” for “home” so:
sudo flatpak override com.inform7.IDE --filesystem=host:create
This allows access to a subset of “safe” directories on the system, but access to root and other “sensitive” directories is still forbidden.
Unfortunately, when you re-open the I7 IDE, you still won’t be able to browse to that folder and re-open it; (everything remains grayed out) but the “Open last project” button will work, and from there if you click on “File” the “recent” list will also work.
The flatpak is also forbidden to access the net, but this can be over-ridden with:
sudo flatpak override com.inform7.IDE --share=network
This did indeed allow the flatpak to access the 'net, and should in theory allow the IDE to download extensions, but I found the download links didn’t work, producing the error ““Assorted Text Generation.i7x?id=1” by Emily Short could not be downloaded. The error was: Operation not supportedOperation not supported”. Clicking on the download all button crashed the app.
If you want to check what overrides you’ve allowed, then type:
flatpak override com.inform7.IDE --show
(no need for sudo)
If you want to rescind permissions, it appears that you must reset them and then start again.
sudo flatpak override com.inform7.IDE --reset (not tested)
Note that if you don’t specify a particular flatpak (as we’re doing) then you’re granting permissions etc. for all flatpaks on your system.
Hope that helps.