Re: [Visualpython-users] Problem installing on WinXP SP2

[Joe H. <hea...@ct...>]

On May 12, 2005, at 9:23 AM, Bruce Sherwood wrote:

> It shouldn't matter that you have other versions of Python present; I 
> have Python 2.3 on my machine as well as Python 2.4 and haven't seen 
> such a problem.
>
> Can you say more about not having administrator access? As Gary Pajer 
> comments, it seems odd that you could install Python if you're 
> explicitly locked out of being permitted to do software installations. 
> There is an option (or at least there use to be) to install Python in 
> your own documents if you don't have installation permission. In such 
> a "registry-less" installation the registry is not touched.
>
> My best guess is that somehow you managed to install Python 2.4 
> without the registry being updated, so that the VPython installer's 
> first attempt to find python2.4 fails. It is possible that the VPython 
> installer then does the wrong thing after asking you for a location, 
> and I'll look into that later today. Thanks for the report.

I have similar problems with installing Python and VPython on my lab 
computers running Win2000. Our IT guys don't give faculty admin 
privileges on our lab machines. I can't install either Python or 
VPython correctly and IDLE will not run without admin privileges. 
They've set up a hack using something called "tcqrunas" to make it run 
but it still doesn't work correctly. Specifically, IDLE doesn't know 
where any VPython programs are and the default save directory was at 
one time visible to the entire network. In one class students were 
unknowingly overwriting each other's programs by saving their own 
programs with the same name. Changes were showing up without 
explanation! Our IT guys either can't or won't fix it. So much for 
competence.

Cheers,
Joe Heafner -- Astronomy/Physics Instructor (by some definitions)