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Cross-platform installer package?
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| slippymississippi@yahoo.com 2006-09-01, 6:58 pm |
| Does anyone know of a cross-platform installer package? Scanning
Google, it appears that the installer package landscape is all focused
on specific operating systems.
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| apulido@gmail.com 2006-09-04, 7:58 am |
| You can try BitRock's InstallBuilder
http://www.bitrock.com/download_ins...r_download.html
Regards,
Araceli Pulido
slippymississippi@yahoo.com wrote:
> Does anyone know of a cross-platform installer package? Scanning
> Google, it appears that the installer package landscape is all focused
> on specific operating systems.
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| Chris Hanson 2006-09-04, 6:58 pm |
| On 2006-09-01 07:57:06 -0700, slippymississippi@yahoo.com said:
> Does anyone know of a cross-platform installer package? Scanning
> Google, it appears that the installer package landscape is all focused
> on specific operating systems.
I'm not sure what this has to do with Extreme Programming.
That said, different operating systems have very different requirements
for software installation. The idea of a "cross-platform installer
package" doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense. Use the native
installation mechanism on each of your supported platforms, and your
users will get the best experience on their preferred platform.
For example, on Windows this would mean leveraging the Windows
installer infrastructure, and on Mac OS X this would involve either
supporting a drag-install from a disk image or a double-clickable
Installer.app package, while on Red Hat Linux this would be an RPM and
on Debian Linux it would be a Debian package. And so on.
You're not going to find a single generic mechanism that covers all of
these cases and does the right thing by the users of the respective
platforms for every one.
-- Chris
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| Ron Ruble 2006-09-09, 6:59 pm |
| Chris Hanson wrote:
> On 2006-09-01 07:57:06 -0700, slippymississippi@yahoo.com said:
>
>
> I'm not sure what this has to do with Extreme Programming.
Not a darn thing.
> That said, different operating systems have very different requirements
> for software installation. The idea of a "cross-platform installer
> package" doesn't make a heck of a lot of sense. Use the native
> installation mechanism on each of your supported platforms, and your
> users will get the best experience on their preferred platform.
>
> For example, on Windows this would mean leveraging the Windows installer
> infrastructure, and on Mac OS X this would involve either supporting a
> drag-install from a disk image or a double-clickable Installer.app
> package, while on Red Hat Linux this would be an RPM and on Debian Linux
> it would be a Debian package. And so on.
>
> You're not going to find a single generic mechanism that covers all of
> these cases and does the right thing by the users of the respective
> platforms for every one.
>
> -- Chris
>
That's a slight overstatement, but any cross-platform installer
needs to either target a least-common-denominator approach that
doesn't connect to any really OS-specific features, of allow the
use of platform-specific modules.
There aren't many, but there are a few. I haven't worked with
any, however.
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| Eliot Miranda 2006-09-12, 7:00 pm |
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slippymississippi@yahoo.com wrote:
> Does anyone know of a cross-platform installer package? Scanning
> Google, it appears that the installer package landscape is all focused
> on specific operating systems.
VisualWorks' installer targets MacOS 9, MacOS X, Windows and about 9
unixes (including Linux). Dunno if its enough...
see www.cincomsmalltalk.com
We use it to install VisualWorks itself, so its more of a usable
framework than a full product.
HTH
--
_______________,,,^..^,,,____________________________
Eliot Miranda Smalltalk - Scene not herd
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| slippymississippi@yahoo.com 2006-09-15, 6:58 pm |
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Chris Hanson wrote:
> On 2006-09-01 07:57:06 -0700, slippymississippi@yahoo.com said:
>
>
> I'm not sure what this has to do with Extreme Programming.
I think you're right ... with the heavy bandwidth this newsgroup
incurs, it's awfully presumptuous to post a tools-related message. :)
> You're not going to find a single generic mechanism that covers all of
> these cases and does the right thing by the users of the respective
> platforms for every one.
I found an open source tool called "Install Jammer" that shows
tremendous promise. However, it appears to be a little buggy. As you
said, base installs conform to the lowest common denominator. However,
the base installation can be extended with Tcl.
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