I posted the following question earlier in the week, only to have it rejected by the list, because I had just joined the list and wasn't yet approved to post. (I was VERY desperate for a solution.)
But, between the time I posted, and the time the post was rejected, I found a solution. So, in the hopes of helping someone else that might be having a similar problem, here is my question again along with the solution I found:
Hey everyone, I have what I hope is a simple problem:
I've got a little shareware thing that I want to release, and I'm having no luck building an installer package that works reliably. This isn't my first installer package... I've made several in the past, and, in fact, the one I'm having trouble with started life as a duplicate of the last one I did. (Which does almost exactly the same type of install and has worked flawlessly from the get-go.)
So, here's what's happening:
I'm using PackageMaker v3.0.2 (174) (from the iPhone SDK beta 9) on a MacPro running 10.5.4 to create my package. The package itself attempts to install a Contextual Menu Item (CMI) in "~/Library/Contextual Menu Items" and folder of items in "~/Library/Application Support/Send To". (It's a "Send To" type utility.)
When I put this all together and test it, it works exactly as expected on each and every machine that I've upgraded to 10.5.4. However, when I take the package to any 10.5.3 machine, it fails with the message "The Installer could not install some files at ", followed by one of the two destinations shown above. (Sometimes it installs the CMI and fails on the folder of items, sometimes it fails on the CMI.) In the Console, the messages I'm seeing are:
Jul 8 09:57:56 PPC-iMac Installer[1502]: The Installer could not install some files in “/Users/admin/Library/Application Support/Send To”. Contact the software manufacturer for assistance.
Jul 8 10:04:49 PPC-iMac Installer[1551]: The Installer could not install some files in “/Users/admin/Library/Contextual Menu Items”. Contact the software manufacturer for assistance.
(Note that the install fails the same way on both Intel and PPC macs.)
Now, having noted the 10.5.4 vs 10.5.3 thing, I thought I might just be able to drop back a version and build my package in a different version of PackageMaker. So, I started up version 3.0.1 (172) on a 10.5.3 machine and tried building a new package from scratch. The result was, unfortunately, the same.
I should also note that:
* As far as I can tell, my content permissions are set properly. [Using the "apply recommendations" button on all the files I'm attempting to install.]
* I've tried this with and without root authentication, with the same result.
* I've repaired permissions on the target 10.5.3 machine.
So, I'm kinda lost... Is it possible that the files themselves are hosing the install? If that's the case, why does it always work on 10.5.4? I've considered filing a bug on this, but I don't feel like I really have enough to go on yet.
This installation is actually simple enough to have the user do by hand, or I could do an AppleScript, but I really don't want to take either of those roads. So, any help at all will be much appreciated!
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So, the solution? When you start up PackageMaker, make sure that your target OS is set to Tiger. NOT Leopard. That's it. Everything works as expected. Now, the question of "Why?" is one I'd REALLY like to have answered....
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