First we'll need some dependencies that are in the laboratory repo. So we need to copy the default entry in /etc/apt/sources.list and change the word "green" to "laboratory".

Next we install the dependencies: sudo apt-get install libgnome-desktop-3-dev libgtk-3-dev libpam0g-dev libupower-glib-dev libwayland-dev meson

Got it?

But wait there's more, we need to install git and checkout some repos as libhandy is dependency. So sudo apt-get install git then download libhandy:

sudo apt-get -y install gtk-doc-tools libgirepository1.0-dev libgnome-desktop-3-dev libgtk-3-dev meson pkg-config valac

cd libhandy cause of course we need to actually build this first...

meson . _build

Did that complete ok?

ninja -C _build (not even sure what "ninja" is at this point)

sudo ninja -C _build install

It's basically the same build steps for phosh. When I first did this I followed the directions and tried the _build/run command but got a can't open shared object file for the libhandy .so file. Ok, so maybe the objects need to be symlinked in /usr/lib so dynamic linking works for libhandy

cd /usr/lib/

link -s ~/PLACE_WE_DOWNLOADED_OUR_REPOS/_build/src/libhandy.0.0.so.0

Let's try that. Still no dice.

vm:~/code/phosh$ _build/run
+ exec /home/bond/code/phosh/_build/src/phosh

(process:15399): Gtk-WARNING **: 20:13:21.723: Locale not supported by C library.
Using the fallback 'C' locale.

(phosh:15399): Gdk-CRITICAL **: 20:13:21.896: gdk_wayland_display_get_wl_display: assertion 'GDK_IS_WAYLAND_DISPLAY (display)' failed

(phosh:15399): phosh-phosh-ERROR **: 20:13:21.896: Failed to get display: Success

Trace/breakpoint trap

Well crap, "Failed to get display: Success", is never good (hilarious, but not good). Maybe this has something to due with the wlroots thing I've seen before which might be a necessary shim into Wayland. A quick look and it looks like it is our compositor, <sarcasm>kind of an important thing if we want to work with the display</sarcasm>.