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From: Brendon C. <end...@ya...> - 2002-05-02 17:13:11
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I think we should have ONE installation program which encompasses all the programs. This will allow you to decide which programs you want to install. Then within each program section you can decide which features to install. 1)Regarding HTML based installation, Mozilla as far as i know, does not have capabilities of allowing any kind of file operations, without a signed script. I have never actually done this with mozilla, but im sure there is a way. 2) Internet Explorer allows for ActiveX Scripting (security alert!!), of which can easily be used to create a nice interface with an easy to use installer. However, this is deopendent on a proproetary system in a way. 3) We could create a JAVA/swing based installation. This could be very convenienet seeing that it would be cross platform. This idea is my personal favorite, seing that it would be the most flexible. 4) We could do a perl-GTK, or php-GTK based installations, of which would not be as elegant as the JAVA installation but it would get the job done. 5) We could do a HTML based installation, of which will then send the information to a backend PHP or PERL installer via a miniture portable local web server. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com |
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From: Christian <chr...@ad...> - 2002-05-02 17:44:28
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This is my first stab at this sort of project so bear with me. I am not a programer, some of these programs I have not used. So I ask myself how can I best help? When we have a finished product, or a complete project description in presentation format; I am able to present the idea or product to a variety of financial institutions for possible distribution/sponsorship to the financial(brokerage and insurance) industry. Message will be be along the lines of 'freely available productivity tools to offer to represenatives'. Why do I say sponsorship or distribution? I think it is only fair to charge the hard cost of this product to the institution(s) ie...the cd cost, burn time and/or any labels or shipping. They will probably be interested in some sort of private-labeling concept to whatever degree. So...I can ask them for projected costs, or other sponsorship bucks as needed. In terms of distribution...my hope is to convince these institutions to give it a try and hand it out to their representatives. So...I will keep tabs on this forum and offer whatever paltry advice I can. When the time comes for me to start promoting the front end let me know and I will give it my best. Here is my contact info: Christian Ramsey Advisor Page (www.advisorpage.com) 916-331-3911 (us) |
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From: Buchan M. <bg...@ca...> - 2002-05-02 18:38:24
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-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 Brendon Crawford wrote: | I think we should have ONE installation program which | encompasses all the programs. This will allow you to | decide which programs you want to install. Then within | each program section you can decide which features to | install. | Seems like too much work for too little gain, IMHO. It might be possible to select the apps, and have the autorun app launch each of the installers in sequence. | 1)Regarding HTML based installation, Mozilla as far as | i know, does not have capabilities of allowing any | kind of file operations, without a signed script. I | have never actually done this with mozilla, but im | sure there is a way. | Well, one could generate a cert, and add the cert to the profile used to ~ run mozilla (on the CD), and sign the app with the cert? This assumes running Mozilla/gecko from the CD (where we have control of the cert store). Can gecko run with a read-only profile? Can mozilla run with a read-only profile. | 2) Internet Explorer allows for ActiveX Scripting | (security alert!!), of which can easily be used to | create a nice interface with an easy to use installer. | However, this is deopendent on a proproetary system in | a way. | Running IE from the CD or the target machine? I don't think relying on the IE installed is a good idea .... Plus using proprietary software to deliver the installer doesn't seem to kosher ... | 3) We could create a JAVA/swing based installation. | This could be very convenienet seeing that it would be | cross platform. This idea is my personal favorite, | seing that it would be the most flexible. | Can the JRE be run from a CD? Or would it need to be installed first? | 4) We could do a perl-GTK, or php-GTK based | installations, of which would not be as elegant as the | JAVA installation but it would get the job done. Is it feasible to have the perl modules or php classes this thing would depend on accessible in a consistent place? If so, I think php-gtk might be a viable option. | | 5) We could do a HTML based installation, of which | will then send the information to a backend PHP or | PERL installer via a miniture portable local web server. | I don't know how you are going to configure your web server on the fly to take into account different drive letters. 6)Is there anything wrong with wxWindows? The advantage is that it would not depend on anything (AFAIK), as it translates everything to MSCVRT or somesuch (might need one wrapper dll, not sure). Plus there are versions for gtk, motif/lesstif,Mac OS X, maybe more ... Buchan - -- |----------------Registered Linux User #182071-----------------| Buchan Milne Mechanical Engineer, Network Manager Cellphone * Work +27 82 472 2231 * +27 21 8828820x202 Stellenbosch Automotive Engineering http://www.cae.co.za GPG Key http://ranger.dnsalias.com/bgmilne.asc 1024D/60D204A7 2919 E232 5610 A038 87B1 72D6 AC92 BA50 60D2 04A7 -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.0.6 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org iD8DBQE80XyPrJK6UGDSBKcRAoT3AKC/sFrW8ZaA9itWW/F9PWbRziEibACgn2Tl QIaFrdOJ5Rh7nHEpbdIMAgc= =IOw7 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- |
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From: Alex R. <tun...@pa...> - 2002-05-02 21:27:24
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Buchan Milne wrote: > Brendon Crawford wrote: > | I think we should have ONE installation program which > | encompasses all the programs. This will allow you to > | decide which programs you want to install. Then within > | each program section you can decide which features to > | install. > Seems like too much work for too little gain, IMHO. It might be possible > to select the apps, and have the autorun app launch each of the > installers in sequence. This makes more sense to me. As I recall, most good programming languages have the ability to call and run another program. We'll certainly have the ability to use or make a temp directory on the C drive for any interpreters we use (if we use them.) > | 2) Internet Explorer allows for ActiveX Scripting > | (security alert!!), of which can easily be used to > | create a nice interface with an easy to use installer. > | However, this is deopendent on a proproetary system in > | a way. > | > > Running IE from the CD or the target machine? I don't think relying on > the IE installed is a good idea .... Plus using proprietary software to > deliver the installer doesn't seem to kosher ... Yeah, that gives Microsoft a lot of power. Imagine the next update to IE... > | 3) We could create a JAVA/swing based installation. > | This could be very convenienet seeing that it would be > | cross platform. This idea is my personal favorite, > | seing that it would be the most flexible. > | > Can the JRE be run from a CD? Or would it need to be installed first? We could certainly put it in C:\temp. > | 5) We could do a HTML based installation, of which > | will then send the information to a backend PHP or > | PERL installer via a miniture portable local web server. > I don't know how you are going to configure your web server on the fly > to take into account different drive letters. Yeah, now we've got to install a web server first... That sounds a little clunky. As to getting the drive letter of the CD, Windows should have that in memory somewhere - if "MY COMPUTER" can find it, we should be able to as well. IMHO, if we decide to include compilers/interpreters on the CD, we should write the install program in one of the languages we install and include the source. We should be able to find (or wrap) everything we're going to install in a self extracting .exe file, which usually invokes the installer. After the endures had picked the programs they wanted to install, our installer would do something like this: QUERIES WINDOWS FOR CD DRIVE LETTER AND PUTS IT IN VARIABLE $Drive_letter # The installer learns that the CD drive is "F" on this machine # The installer goes through a list of variables: IF $Mozilla="yes" THEN CALL $Drive_letter:\Mozilla\Mozilla.exe # Mozilla.exe runs, extracts the archive, and installs Mozilla IF $XBasic="yes" THEN CALL $Drive_letter:\Xbasic\Xbasic.exe #In this case $XBasic="no" so the installer goes onto the next thing. Unfortunately the only language I'm competent to code such a thing in is and old BASIC language called ASIC... Oh the joys of being ten years behind. Alex |
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From: Captain N. <ne...@th...> - 2002-05-02 22:49:44
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Alex Roston wrote: >Unfortunately the only language I'm competent to code such a thing in is >and old BASIC language called ASIC... Oh the joys of being ten years >behind. > > You should take a look at BCX <http://bcx.basicguru.com/> it's a great BASIC to C converter that works with LCC to create wonderfully tiny and lightning fast windows apps. It'll get you up to speed in no time at all. It even has some great Windows GUI functions for creating your windows etc. Great stuff, there are hundreds of examples for you to fool around with. Actually it could even be used to make the autorun installer, it's very simple. |
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From: J A. F. <jaa...@ya...> - 2002-05-02 23:44:08
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--- Alex Roston <tun...@pa...> wrote: > Buchan Milne wrote: > > > Brendon Crawford wrote: > > | I think we should have ONE installation program which > > | encompasses all the programs. This will allow you to > > | decide which programs you want to install. Then within > > | each program section you can decide which features to > > | install. > > > Seems like too much work for too little gain, IMHO. It might be possible > > to select the apps, and have the autorun app launch each of the > > installers in sequence. > > This makes more sense to me. As I recall, most good programming > languages have the ability to call and run another program. We'll > certainly have the ability to use or make a temp directory on the C > drive for any interpreters we use (if we use them.) > > > | 2) Internet Explorer allows for ActiveX Scripting > > | (security alert!!), of which can easily be used to > > | create a nice interface with an easy to use installer. > > | However, this is deopendent on a proproetary system in > > | a way. > > | > > > > Running IE from the CD or the target machine? I don't think relying on > > the IE installed is a good idea .... Plus using proprietary software to > > deliver the installer doesn't seem to kosher ... > > Yeah, that gives Microsoft a lot of power. Imagine the next update to > IE... > > > | 3) We could create a JAVA/swing based installation. > > | This could be very convenienet seeing that it would be > > | cross platform. This idea is my personal favorite, > > | seing that it would be the most flexible. > > | > > Can the JRE be run from a CD? Or would it need to be installed first? > > We could certainly put it in C:\temp. > > > | 5) We could do a HTML based installation, of which > > | will then send the information to a backend PHP or > > | PERL installer via a miniture portable local web server. > > > I don't know how you are going to configure your web server on the fly > > to take into account different drive letters. > > Yeah, now we've got to install a web server first... That sounds a > little clunky. As to getting the drive letter of the CD, Windows should > have that in memory somewhere - if "MY COMPUTER" can find it, we should > be able to as well. > > IMHO, if we decide to include compilers/interpreters on the CD, we > should write the install program in one of the languages we install and > include the source. We should be able to find (or wrap) everything we're > going to install in a self extracting .exe file, which usually invokes > the installer. > > After the endures had picked the programs they wanted to install, our > installer would do something like this: > > > QUERIES WINDOWS FOR CD DRIVE LETTER AND PUTS IT IN VARIABLE > $Drive_letter > > # The installer learns that the CD drive is "F" on this machine > > # The installer goes through a list of variables: > > IF $Mozilla="yes" THEN CALL $Drive_letter:\Mozilla\Mozilla.exe > # Mozilla.exe runs, extracts the archive, and installs Mozilla > > IF $XBasic="yes" THEN CALL $Drive_letter:\Xbasic\Xbasic.exe > #In this case $XBasic="no" so the installer goes onto the next thing. > > Unfortunately the only language I'm competent to code such a thing in is > and old BASIC language called ASIC... Oh the joys of being ten years > behind. > > Alex > > _______________________________________________________________ > > Have big pipes? SourceForge.net is looking for download mirrors. We supply > the hardware. You get the recognition. Email Us: ban...@so... > _______________________________________________ > Opencd-devel mailing list > Ope...@li... > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/opencd-devel __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com |
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From: J A. F. <jaa...@ya...> - 2002-05-02 23:59:30
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Sorry about that last post. I just changed email clients and I'm still getting used to the set up. About java: --- Alex Roston <tun...@pa...> wrote: > Buchan Milne wrote: > > > Brendon Crawford wrote: > > | 3) We could create a JAVA/swing based installation. > > | This could be very convenienet seeing that it would be > > | cross platform. This idea is my personal favorite, > > | seing that it would be the most flexible. > > | > > Can the JRE be run from a CD? Or would it need to be installed first? > > We could certainly put it in C:\temp. > > Alex > The java.exe can be run from the CD directly without installing it. I just confirmed that a second ago. Despite the fact that I am a java developer and supporter, I feel we should NOT use java for our installation language. Java, both the language and the virtual machine are NOT open source. While there is Kaffe, it's only java 1.1 compliant, and that limits us a lot. If we do create any sort of installer, then it should be written in an open source language. My feeling is that everything that goes into this CD should be open source, including the tools by which it is developed and delivered if at all possible. And one last word about a unified installer. While having one single installer is nice, it has several draw backs. First, we're duplicating effort. Also, the installer will have to be regularly updated for each new release of the software we provide on the CD. An HTML based installer would be much simplier. Plus, then when the user decides to update Mozilla or whatever, they would already familiar be with the software's native installer. Finally, I feel that by providing an HTML front end we can easily provide links to documentation and resources found on the CD, plus links to our websites and other projects. Localization will also be easier and creating an single unified look and feel for both installer and website can be easily done by using the same stylesheets. At least that's my $0.02 jaaron __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Health - your guide to health and wellness http://health.yahoo.com |
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From: Alex R. <tun...@pa...> - 2002-05-02 23:41:20
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Captain Nemo wrote: > > Alex Roston wrote: > > >Unfortunately the only language I'm competent to code such a thing in is > >and old BASIC language called ASIC... Oh the joys of being ten years > >behind. > > > > > You should take a look at BCX <http://bcx.basicguru.com/> it's a great > BASIC to C converter that works with LCC to create wonderfully tiny and > lightning fast windows apps. It'll get you up to speed in no time at > all. It even has some great Windows GUI functions for creating your > windows etc. Great stuff, there are hundreds of examples for you to fool > around with. Thanks for the tip. However, I currently have some other stuff I'm working on. I'll just stick to writing documentation and helping out with testing - that's what I do best. Alex |
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