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Installation

pgNimbus ships for Windows, macOS and Linux. Windows is the primary target and the most polished. The macOS and Linux builds are early beta.

Windows

The Store package is signed by Microsoft and updates itself, so there are no SmartScreen warnings and nothing to re-download by hand.

Get pgNimbus on the Microsoft Store

WinGet

winget install pgNimbus --source msstore

This installs the same Store package, so it carries the same signature.

MSI

Download pgNimbus-<version>-win-x64.msi from the releases page. It is a per-user installer: it writes to %LocalAppData% and needs no administrator rights.

The MSI is unsigned

pgNimbus is a free project with no revenue, so it does not buy a code signing certificate. SmartScreen will warn on first run; click More info then Run anyway. If that bothers you, use the Store or WinGet path above. The Store re-signs the package for free, which is why it is the recommended route. You can also verify the download's provenance instead of trusting the warning either way.

macOS

Apple Silicon only. Download pgNimbus-<version>-macos-arm64.dmg from the releases page. Open the disk image, drag pgNimbus onto the Applications folder beside it, then eject the image. Running the app from the mounted image works, but it disappears the moment you eject.

The build carries an ad-hoc signature instead of an Apple Developer ID one, so macOS asks about it the first time you open it:

Right-click (or Control-click) pgNimbus in Applications, choose Open, then Open again in the dialog.

Double-click pgNimbus and dismiss the warning. Open System Settings → Privacy & Security, scroll to the security section, and click Open Anyway next to the message about pgNimbus.

You do this once per installed version. Later launches open normally.

If macOS says the app is damaged

That dialog means the download carries no signature at all, which is what 0.11.1 and earlier shipped. There is no Open Anyway path out of it. Either download a later build, or clear the quarantine flag by hand:

xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/pgNimbus.app

The command works as a fallback on any version, including from Downloads if you have not moved the app yet.

No Intel build

GitHub retired its last Intel macOS runner in December 2025, so there is no hosted way to build an osx-x64 binary. Apple Silicon only for now.

Linux

x64 and arm64 builds, in three formats, all on the releases page.

Works on any distribution and installs nothing.

chmod +x pgNimbus-<version>-linux-<arch>.AppImage
./pgNimbus-<version>-linux-<arch>.AppImage

sudo apt install ./pgNimbus-<version>-linux-<arch>.deb
pgnimbus

The package also adds pgNimbus to your application menu. Its dependencies are the X11 libraries Avalonia needs plus fontconfig; the rendering stack itself is bundled.

tar xf pgNimbus-<version>-linux-<arch>.tar.gz
cd pgNimbus-<version>
./PgNimbus.App

Verifying a download

The direct downloads are unsigned, but every release asset carries signed build provenance. One command proves a file was built by this repository's release workflow from the tagged commit, rather than tampered with or rehosted:

gh attestation verify pgNimbus-<version>-win-x64.msi --repo Shman4ik/pgNimbus

Each release also ships SHA256SUMS.txt and a CycloneDX SBOM (pgNimbus-<version>-sbom.cdx.json) listing every bundled dependency.

Where pgNimbus keeps its files

What Location
Connection profiles, saved queries, history, settings, workspace <appdata>/pgNimbus/
Crash log <appdata>/pgNimbus/logs/pgnimbus.log
Passwords DPAPI-encrypted files on Windows; Keychain on macOS; Secret Service via libsecret-1.so.0 on Linux. Unavailable storage uses session memory with a visible warning. Never the profile file. Legacy unencrypted .cred files are migrated when profiles are opened, then removed only after verification. See credential storage.

On Windows <appdata> is %AppData%. On macOS and Linux it follows the platform's usual application-data location.

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