[lazarus] New Win32 Installer Now Available!!!

[michael at tfdec1.fys.kuleuven.ac.be]

On Fri, 16 Jul 1999, Michael A. Hess wrote:

> d0hb0y wrote:
> > 
> > I just ran it, it looks very nice! :)
> 
> Great!
>  
> > I'm just a picky S.O.B. so dont take it personally :-)
> 
> None taken.  :-)
>  
> > Wise is extremely powerful, yet not as wacked out as InstallShield.  I
> > love it.
> 
> I've been using before anyone ever even heard of them, when they were
> just a small shareware product. It makes InstallShield look like a joke
> with what you have to go through to make an installing using it. I just
> converted the company I am doing some work for. They were using
> InstallShield and when I put my copy of Wise on the machine and built a
> new install in 10 mintues which matched something they took days upon
> days to do they walked over to another desk and placed an order on the
> spot.  :-)
> 
> > Which brings up a good point, I have yet to see a "good" install
> > mechanism for Linux... maybe one can be written someday in Lazarus :)
> 
> There has been alot of discussion going on on the Gnome mailing lists
> about this very subject. The general opinion is that it isn't needed and
> that are more trouble then they are worth. I myself disagree. While RPM
> does do the job to a point it is far from user friendly and just having
> a nice frontend to RPM still doesn't totally do it. At least I haven't
> seen one yet that does. The big argument was that they felt that an
> installer shouldn't let a person have a choice of where they want their
> files. It should put them where it wants to put them. That is basically
> what RPM does and why I don't totally like it.

Yes, but you must adhere to Unix philosophy : You jus DON'T put the files
wherever you want; one of the nice things about unix is that you KNOW where
everything is !

If everybody starts craeting packages that install themselves God knows
where, we're right back on Dos and Windows.

This is the very reason the File Hierarchy Standard was created; so
you KNOW where to put your files.

So in that respect, RPM does it's job quite well; 

I agree, though, that a nice user interface is badly needed, If only to
make the user more comfortable, and give him the feeling he's got some
control over the process. I continuously have troubles finding out 
what an RPM contains, what scripts it'll run etc. 
Usually it boils down to downloading the sources and doing everything 
myself, so I'm in full control. But then, this is not really an option 
for 99% of the people, hence RPM is a good idea.

Just my thoughts.

Michael.