Cut the Windows install from 541 MB to 212 MB (stop shipping unused VLC builds and symbols)

[demortes]

The installed Windows app was 541 MB. About 320 MB of that was packaging waste, not the app.

What was in the install

	Size
libvlc/win-x86 + libvlc/win-arm64 (VLC builds for CPUs the x64 installer never runs on)	~182 MB
libSkiaSharp.pdb + libHarfBuzzSharp.pdb (native debug symbols)	~100 MB
libvlc.dylib (a macOS library in a Windows install)	~40 MB
VLC x64 + .NET runtime + Avalonia + the app	~220 MB

Causes: VideoLAN.LibVLC.Windows copies the x64, x86 and arm64 engines unless told otherwise (its targets file exposes VlcWindowsX86Enabled / VlcWindowsArm64Enabled, which were never set), VideoLAN.LibVLC.Mac adds libvlc.dylib to every build, and SkiaSharp/HarfBuzzSharp ship their native .pdb files in the same runtimes/ folder as the DLLs. The csproj comment claimed these were "filtered by target RID at publish time"; they are not. The Linux publish carried the Windows and macOS VLC builds as well, which is why its tarball was 185 MB.

Change (EDNexus.App.csproj only)

• Reference and enable only the LibVLC runtime the target needs, from RuntimeIdentifier (a plain dev build with no RID uses the machine it is built on): Windows package only for win-*, Mac package only for osx-*, and only the matching architecture of the Windows engine.
• Drop the third-party native .pdb files (libSkiaSharp, libHarfBuzzSharp) from the publish list. EDNexus's own .pdb files stay.

Measured (local dotnet publish -c Release --self-contained)

Target	Before	After
win-x64	541 MB (installed)	212 MB
linux-x64	tarball 185 MB	108 MB uncompressed (system libvlc is used there, so none is bundled)

After: only libvlc/win-x64, no .dylib, no native symbol files. Full dotnet test green. The Windows installer and Flatpak bundle should shrink accordingly in the next release.

Safe because

• The installer publishes win-x64 only, so the x86/arm64 VLC builds were never loaded. On Windows on ARM an x64 process runs under emulation and LibVLCSharp loads the x64 engine; Elite Dangerous itself is x64-only.
• Linux uses the system libvlc, never the bundled Windows/macOS files.

Not verified

I could not run the installed app or play audio here (a locally built app auto-installs the latest release). Please smoke-test the radio from a build of this (start a station) before relying on it; the removed files are architectures and symbols the x64 build does not use, so this is expected to be a no-op for playback.

Possible next steps (not in this PR)

• Prune VLC's x64 plugins down to what internet radio needs (video outputs/codecs, GUI, Lua, visualisation): another ~50 MB, but needs a real playback test per station format, so it is its own change.
• PublishTrimmed/ReadyToRun for the .NET part: riskier with Avalonia, separate effort.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

Summary by CodeRabbit

• Chores
  • Platform builds now include LibVLC components for Windows and macOS, with Windows assets selected for the target architecture.
  • Published packages no longer include SkiaSharp and HarfBuzzSharp debug symbol files.

[coderabbitai]

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📝 Walkthrough

📝 Walkthrough

Walkthrough

The application project now selects LibVLC native packages based on the target platform and Windows architecture. During publishing, it removes resolved PDB files named libSkiaSharp or libHarfBuzzSharp.

Changes

Application build and publish

Layer / File(s)	Summary
Platform detection and native packages src/EDNexus.App/EDNexus.App.csproj	Build properties detect the target platform from the runtime identifier or, without one, the build host. Windows architecture assets are selected by runtime identifier or process architecture. LibVLC package references are conditional on the detected platform.
Publish symbol filtering src/EDNexus.App/EDNexus.App.csproj	A publish target removes resolved libSkiaSharp and libHarfBuzzSharp PDB files. Other symbols are not removed.

Priority: ⬇️ Low

Estimated code review effort: 2 (Simple) | ~10 minutes

Change: Bug fix

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Merge Risk: ⚪ Minimal · up to 7e0b3

This change shrinks the install size by shipping only the LibVLC runtime for the target platform and dropping third-party native symbol files. No concrete merge-blocking risk was found. The author asks for a radio playback smoke test from a built artifact, which is a reasonable follow-up check.

Pre-merge checks | 5

✅ Passed checks (5 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Description Check		Check skipped - CodeRabbit’s high-level summary is enabled.
Title check		The title clearly summarizes the main change: reducing the Windows installation size by removing unused LibVLC builds and native symbol files.
Docstring Coverage		No functions found in the changed files to evaluate docstring coverage. Skipping docstring coverage check. Docstring coverage is scoped to functions touched by this diff. Analyzed 0 functions across 0…
Linked Issues check		Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.
Out of Scope Changes check		Check skipped because no linked issues were found for this pull request.

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