I'm developing an "installation" like cocoa application wich needs to take care of some http request, some file system reading, copying files to /usr/share, set up cron (not launchd) and ask some information to user.
I discarded PackageMaker since I need more flexibility.
Currently everything is going well, but on my last installation step, I need to:
Delete my previously installed application folder (if exists). It's always the same path: /usr/share/MY_APP
Create again the application folder at: /usr/share/MY_APP
Copy application files to /usr/share/MY_APP
Update a cron job
It's very important that /usr/share/MY_APP keeps protected with administrative privileges, so a regular shouldn't delete it.
What would be the best approach to implement those steps?
BTW, I'm using Xcode 3.2.
Thanks a lot!
Carlos.
Between the preflight script, the postflight script, and perhaps an Installer plug-in for the custom UI, I see no reason why you can't do all of this in PackageMaker.
Note: “Installer plug-in” is a little misleading. The user does not have to install the plug-in somewhere as a separate step; you include the plug-in inside your package, and Installer will use it from there.
The relevant document is a ReadMe file in a sample code project. There's also an Installer plug-in project template in Xcode since 2.0.
Also, an Installer plug-in won't get used if the user does a command-line installation. Of course, they can't install from the command line at all (which includes remote installation onto an office or lab full of machines) if you write your own custom installer.
By the way: Why /usr/share? What are you putting there? There may be a better way to do what you're really trying to accomplish.
Related
I have a scenario,
On a particular machine, I am installing my custom software with MSI installer. MSI installer is created with PerMachine tag, so software is available for all the users of that machine.
Now,
I installed the software on C:\MyApp\ directory.
Then I modified a few configuration files present in C:\MyApp\Config folder to make sure the software connects with my other services.
I started the application, it's working fine.
Now, on the same machine, I logged in with another user.
I started the application.
MSI windows popup with some progress bar for installation.
It vanishes and the application starts but fails to load.
But all the files I have modified are reverted now, I need to again modify those.
Few points:
My installation direcotry is C:\MyApp, not any custom user directory. So modified files should be for all the users.
I think MSI is rolling back changes when I logged in with the new user.
How to stop this?
Please help
Self-Repair: Windows Installer self-repair is the cause of the behavior you see. See the link for an explanation of what happens. See more here - several links with information on self-repair from various angles.
Short Explanation: Essentially the launching of an advertised shortcut triggers an integrity check of the installed files and if a file or registry setting is found to be missing a self-repair ensues. It will put in place missing files and settings. During this process it will sometimes overwrite changed settings files - the problem you describe (due to various file overwrite oddities of Windows Installer - a long answer with various hints).
Fix?: My preferred fix for this is to not install the settings files and update them, but to rather have your application generate them on first launch - either one file per user or a shared one for all users. You can also use a read-only copy of the settings file that you install to copy to a new file that you generate and update. I also recommend you put these files in a writable location in the user profile and not in the main folder. Your setup will never interfere with these generated files. You can also try to set the hosting component for the files "permanent" and "never overwrite". Not very neat. Here is a whole rant on the subject. The very best solution - in my opinion - is to keep settings in databases and get them on launch. This allows good control of all settings. Look out for network and firewall issues.
I hope this answers your question. Are you installing IIS files? I find commercial tool Advanced Installer to have the better feature list for IIS installation - though I lack enough data to conclude. Some videos here: https://www.youtube.com/c/advancedinstaller/search?query=IIS - WiX is also very good, but without the nice GUI of Advanced Installer.
Note: you really should not install to the root of C:\ anything at all. Windows Installer actively tries to make it hard, and side-effects are likely. You can, however, target the IIS folders - wherever they are located.
Update: I found this old answer on how to allow selective update of settings files - I had to resurrect the linked forum answers from Wayback.
I'm writing an installer for an application. Most of the installer is done and working, but I have on more step outstanding. I need some way to add a setup window to the installer, that will take user input like server address and port, etc. and write these to the relevant files for system start-up. This preferably done through a GUI of sorts inside the installer.
I've tried creating an executable file that runs after installation, but this does not always execute on different systems.
Is there a way to add a GUI to the installer itself that executes after the directory structures and files have been put into place?
Thanks in advance.
In general you should seriously consider doing this as a standalone app that runs when the app first runs and needs configuring. Then it's a program that runs in a user context and can be tested and debugged in the normal way. At least consider what the user is going to do if they want to change the server address or the port - will they need to uninstall your app and reinstall it just to change the server details or the port?
The GUI may not run correctly when started from the install for a number of reasons. It may be initiated with the system account if it's a deferred CA. It wasn't started from the interactive user shell, so it probably won't have any idea of a working directory. It's being run from an msiexec.exe process running in the system directory and maybe with a system account - that's not really the place to be doing your GUI configuration.
I assume you're using WiX, it doesn't say so in your question but it's tagged with WiX.
I would have a read of http://wix.tramontana.co.hu/tutorial/user-interface-revisited (or http://www.dizzymonkeydesign.com/blog/misc/adding-and-customizing-dlgs-in-wix-3/ has a relatively easy to read example), you can add or edit any of the dialogue boxes in the installer, you'll need to download the source to get at the built in dialog, and it does require some "play" to get everything quite right but worth it to get a professional looking installer.
Where I can download VSTO Office Runtime version 10.0.40820?
I need link for this specific version, NOT for the newest one (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=158918).
Why I need this specific version? I created custom InstallShield .PRQ for VSTO that download file from web and checks if file is not corrupted using MD5 hash.
If I use generic download link and MS will deploy new version of VSTO then setup will complaint about corrupted file.
InstallShield has abstractions in their PRQ file that are meant to help but I have found problematic.
First, the PRQ itself can have a URL. This means that at runtime the PRQ embedded into the setup.exe will go try to download a newer version of itself from this URL. If this happens, the new XML is used and yours is ignored. This sounds like a good idea to keep things fresh and up to date but the CM Nazi in me see's this as a man in the middle vunerability that compromises the integrity of the build.
The second is that your XML or the downloaded XML both have URL attributes on the individual files. Again the CM Nazi in me says that while this seems like a good idea, it's really inserting an external dependency that isn't under my control and again violating the integrity of the build.
If it was me, I'd never use InstallShield and/or Microsoft URL's in my PRQ files. Host the content yourself and do change management of that so you can have complete control. If longevity of the build is desired then don't use web downloads in the first place. Bake it all into the EXE.
As for the exact question you asked, I'll have to google for it. But really I'd probably just move onto the latest version and then implement the above advice starting there.
I want to test deployment of my first mono mac app. (yay!)
But I need to create directories to save data in. But I would like to do it part of my install process on the mac. I have no clue how to make that part of the monomac packager???
You might have to forgo creating these folders as a part of your install process and instead modify your application to check for them, and create them if they do not exist, because AFAIK, the current mac-bundle plugin to mdtool doest support that level of customization
I currently have a nightly build system running as a windows scheduled task, calling at batch file, that works sort of like this:
Check out the latest revision from subversion
Modify the AssemblyInfo.vb file of the main executable and the librarys to set the version number to 0.0.0.revision
Invoke MSBuild to build everything (including the installer)
Upload the installer and a log of the build to an FTP server
This works ok, but step 2 is dirty and fragile, and I can't imagine that this the only way to do what I want. Any ideas?
There are a couple of ways to deal with this. You may want to check this post or others tagged with svn (and containing "AssemblyInfo").