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Install

Download

The packages of each version are on the releases page, built by GitHub from that version's sources:

System Package How
Windows 10 and 11 (64-bit) sioul-<version>-setup.exe Run it. Windows may say it does not know the publisher, as the package is not signed yet: More info, then Run anyway.
macOS 13 and later, Apple silicon and Intel Sioul-<version>-macos-universal.dmg Open it, and drag Sioul into Applications. It is not notarised yet: the first time, open it from Applications, then System Settings ▸ Privacy & Security ▸ Open Anyway.
Linux, any distribution (64-bit) Sioul-<version>-x86_64.AppImage Make it executable (chmod +x Sioul-*.AppImage), then run it. On Ubuntu 24.04 and later, its sites run without Chromium's sandbox: prefer the Flatpak there.
Linux, with Flatpak Sioul-<version>.flatpak flatpak install --user Sioul-<version>.flatpak: the KDE runtime and Qt WebEngine come from Flathub.

Each comes with the command line, sioul. These first packages were built and tested by GitHub, but few people have run them yet: a word in GitHub issues helps.

Resources needed

Measured on 4 October 2026 on a Linux computer with 8 cores, over five minutes, with Sioul and every process it starts counted together (memory as PSS: each shared page counted once):

Memory Processor
Sioul alone: an invented profile, no site open about 280 MB close to nothing at rest
Sioul in daily use: a real mailbox, notes and tasks, and three sites open in real time (Proton Mail, Discord, OkCupid) about 1.9 GB in all: Sioul's own process 0.7 GB, the pages of the three sites 1.1 GB 5 % of one core most of the time (under 1 % of the whole computer), a few seconds at up to three quarters of one core every minute or two
  • The sites are the heavy part. Each one kept open costs what a tab of a web browser costs, 100 to 350 MB, and the processor its page uses: a chat that keeps itself up to date is the busiest.
  • Disk: about 4 MB read and written in five minutes.
  • With the window closed, the reminder watcher (Settings ▸ Reminders and notifications) takes 10 MB and almost no processor.
  • What to plan for: 4 GB of memory for Sioul and a few sites beside your other programs, 8 GB to keep many sites open; any processor of the last ten years.

The measure can be made again on any computer: tools/measure-load.py in the sources (building.md).

Or build it from its sources

The rest of this page builds Sioul from its sources: for Linux distributions without packages yet, and to follow the newest changes.

What it needs

  • Rust 1.89 or newer, with Cargo.
  • A C++ compiler: the window is partly written in C++.
  • D-Bus development files, on Linux: for the system keyring, where passwords go, and for notifications.
  • Qt 6.9 or newer (Sioul is built and used with Qt 6.11), with these modules: Qt Declarative (QML and Qt Quick), Qt WebEngine with Qt WebChannel and Qt PDF, Qt Multimedia, Qt Positioning, Qt Location and Qt Image Formats.

Optional, and installable later:

  • ClamAV, to have attachments checked before they open. Without it, Sioul tells you a file will not be checked, and asks before opening it.
  • Tesseract and Poppler, to read the paper letters you scan. Without them, the scans wait, unread. See Papers and letters.

On Linux

The packages

sudo dnf install git rust cargo gcc-c++ dbus-devel \
    qt6-qtbase-devel qt6-qtdeclarative-devel qt6-qtwebengine-devel \
    qt6-qtwebchannel-devel qt6-qtpdf-devel qt6-qtpositioning-devel \
    qt6-qtmultimedia qt6-qtlocation qt6-qtimageformats

Optional: the antivirus, then its signatures, kept up to date:

sudo dnf install clamav clamav-update
sudo freshclam
sudo systemctl enable --now clamav-freshclam

Optional: reading paper letters, in French and English:

sudo dnf install tesseract tesseract-langpack-fra poppler-utils

The D-Bus development files, a C++ compiler, and Qt 6.9 or newer with the modules above, and their QML modules. Distributions name them differently: Debian and Ubuntu as qt6-…-dev and qml6-module-…, Arch as qt6-…. Your release must ship Qt 6.9 or newer.

Rust from rustup.rs when your release's own is older than 1.89.

Sioul is developed on Fedora: other systems have not been tried. If a module is missing, the build stops, or the window does not open and Qt names the missing module in its messages (QT_FORCE_STDERR_LOGGING=1 sioul-app shows them in the terminal). A word in GitHub issues then helps the next person.

Building

git clone https://github.com/aurelienpierre/sioul.git
cd sioul
cargo build --release
cargo build --release -p sioul-app

The first cargo build makes sioul, the command line; the second makes sioul-app, the window. The first build downloads and compiles a few hundred libraries: it takes a while, and a few gigabytes of disk.

Into your application menu

install -Dm755 target/release/sioul-app ~/.local/bin/sioul-app
install -Dm755 target/release/sioul ~/.local/bin/sioul
install -Dm644 data/com.aurelienpierre.Sioul.desktop ~/.local/share/applications/com.aurelienpierre.Sioul.desktop
install -Dm644 data/com.aurelienpierre.Sioul.metainfo.xml ~/.local/share/metainfo/com.aurelienpierre.Sioul.metainfo.xml
mkdir -p ~/.local/share/icons && cp -r data/icons/hicolor ~/.local/share/icons/

Sioul then shows in your application menu as "Sioul". The command line sioul is worth installing too: reminders use it when the window is closed (Settings).

Updating

In the sioul folder: git pull, then the two cargo build lines and the three install lines again. Your settings and data are kept apart from the program, in your own folders: they stay as they are.

Trying it on invented mail first

From the sioul folder, the command line can show the Porch on a few invented messages, without any account:

cargo run -q -- --config examples/demo.toml porch

On Windows

Not tried yet. The steps, for those who want to:

  1. Rust, through rustup, with Microsoft's build tools (MSVC).
  2. Qt 6.9 or newer from Qt's online installer, for MSVC 2022 64-bit, with the modules above, and Qt's bin folder in your PATH.
  3. cargo build --release -p sioul-app.
  4. windeployqt --release --qmldir crates\sioul-app\qml target\release\sioul-app.exe gathers Qt beside the program. packaging\windows\sioul.iss makes an installer with Inno Setup.

On Windows, attachments are checked by Microsoft Defender, through the Antimalware Scan Interface. Reminders come only while the window is open.

On macOS

Not tried yet. The steps are in packaging/macos/README.md: Qt 6.9 or newer from Qt's online installer, Rust from rustup, then cargo build --release -p sioul-app -p sioul-cli and a bundle made with macdeployqt; the build workflow on GitHub can make the same .dmg when started by hand. ClamAV from Homebrew (brew install clamav) checks attachments when it is there. The bundle is not signed yet: macOS asks you to confirm the first opening (right click, Open).

Next

First steps: adding your mail, your calendars and contacts, Google, and the sites you check.