March 2008 - Installer-dev - lists.apple.com

Re: Effects of "allow relocation" in Components tab
by Nathan Duran 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com On Mar 4, 2008, at 5:43 AM, Rick Hoge wrote: Cull away. _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… the new PackageMaker looks really good on the surface Funny, I always thought it looked like an AppleScript Studio front-end for a CLI tool some intern whipped up over the weekend after glancing over a technote on the subject. Ignoring the fact that its functionality could not possibly have been included on anyone's testing matrix given how badly broken it is, is there anyone, anywhere who upon first encountering the "allow relocation" checkbox actually understood what it meant? Maybe there wasn't enough time to make it work, or to document it in any meaningful way, but surely someone had a few seconds with which they could have changed the text to read "locate existing" or "search drive" or pretty much anything else. That table view is not exactly starved for space; it would have fit, and if not, hey, Apple practically invented the help balloon. Remember those crazy things? Yeah, that was the same company. I get the impression that several members of the developer's tools team are generally resentful of the fact that they are expected to put a filthy GUI on their precious Unix binaries so they purposely do as lackluster a job as they possibly can without getting fired--kind of like when you tell a little kid to wash the dishes before he plays Nintendo. Either that or the department just doesn't get enough money to hire anyone with UI experience since priorities have shifted away from fostering enthusiasm amongst developers to growing the uberbrand through walkman sales. But I have a hard time buying that explanation since every product Jack Matthew seems to be in charge of sucks in so many similar ways. Somebody should really pay Stéphane for his services on this list. It's about as useless as Radar without him, and even then it's still pretty useless since Apple never seems to deign to acknowledge the existence of these bugs let alone provide pertinent information on how best to work around them or (gasp!) fix anything in an expeditious manner. I'm sure that's an official DTS policy written in Eskimo blood on a doublewide pair of khaki shorts somewhere, but that doesn't mean it's doing anybody any favors. I know for a fact that there's some really good people working those help lines whose tongues are simply shackled by the post-NeXT bureaucracy, but those people really need to start telling their bosses when they're full of prunes lest we have to put up with this dreckware until they finally amass enough money to buy a backdated house next to Rubenstein's and voluntarily quit writing code. This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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Re: Understanding Metapackages vs Distributed Packages
by Stéphane Sudre 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com On Mar 4, 2008, at 9:58 PM, Robert Kukuchka wrote: _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… Hello all, Sorry for perhaps some mundane questions, but I'm trying to understand the solution that works best for me. Currently I've made a Distribution package with PM 3. Unfortunately a number of our installation items are 3rd party packages (or in some cases metapackages). As far as I'm aware PM 3 packages are distributed packages, and thus cannot support metapackages. I'm trying to determine if it's possible to make a metapackage installer in Leopard Yes, just target Mac OS X 10.3 (Panther) in the Alert sheet that appears when you create a new project (you can call it back later through the menu bar). I'm thinking that a metapackage might be a better solution but how can I mimic the logical branching of a Distributed one. I ONLY need the ability to mark an installer as valid or not based on system version being installed in. I guess this could be done with a script? Yes, just exit with 64 to disable the package. It's not as flexible as a distribution scrip, yet it's less complex to manage. This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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Re: Effects of "allow relocation" in Components tab
by Stéphane Sudre 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com On Mar 4, 2008, at 2:43 PM, Rick Hoge wrote: Thanks for the replies - I'm using it in one package and I like it. _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… So my question: when would it actually be a good idea to check this box? When you build the package for deployment to your customer. That being said, this option may be re-enabled in your back with the current version of PackageMaker. Sorry - maybe I should have said "under what circumstances is it a good idea to check this box?" Sounds like the answer is rarely. Actually, it's a nice feature that works very well. The only thing to consider when you're testing a package with this option on is that you may have more than one instance of the application installed on your Mac. But this won't be the case for the end-user. This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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Re: PackageMaker 3.0.1 and requirement script
by Stéphane Sudre 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com On Mar 4, 2008, at 1:52 PM, Steven Meyer wrote: _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… Manually or through a shell script (which would mean, you may need to build your package/distribution script through the PackageMaker command line). I have only extensively used the latest PackageMaker. The packages produced can not be viewed in the finder with "Show Package Contents". Then you're creating a FLAT package that is compatible with Mac OS X 10.5 or later. You can edit it later using the Flat Package Editor but this is not really easy. This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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Understanding Metapackages vs Distributed Packages
by Robert Kukuchka 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com Cheers Rob _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… Hello all, Sorry for perhaps some mundane questions, but I'm trying to understand the solution that works best for me. Currently I've made a Distribution package with PM 3. Unfortunately a number of our installation items are 3rd party packages (or in some cases metapackages). As far as I'm aware PM 3 packages are distributed packages, and thus cannot support metapackages. I'm trying to determine if it's possible to make a metapackage installer in Leopard, and if that's what I want to do. My Current Distributed package: ------------------------ Benefits to my solution: - logical branching for certain items based on installation version. Meaning I can choose to install only certain packages for 10.4.11, or 10.5.2, etc... Drawbacks: - inability to simply launch a 3rd party installer and have it run without caring about what's inside. I don't want to have to update my installer if the 3rd party installer updates a script, etc.. - inability to link EULA's to specifically installed content I'm thinking that a metapackage might be a better solution but how can I mimic the logical branching of a Distributed one. I ONLY need the ability to mark an installer as valid or not based on system version being installed in. I guess this could be done with a script? Any help would be greatly appreciated on this matter. This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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Re: postinstall script still failing
by Jim Hoyt 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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Re: Effects of "allow relocation" in Components tab
by Rick Hoge 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com Thanks for the replies - Thanks, Rick _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… So my question: when would it actually be a good idea to check this box? When you build the package for deployment to your customer. That being said, this option may be re-enabled in your back with the current version of PackageMaker. Sorry - maybe I should have said "under what circumstances is it a good idea to check this box?" Sounds like the answer is rarely. And another question: what is the logic followed by the Installer when it finds multiple versions of an app in deciding which location (or locations?) to upgrade if it finds them? As far as I know, the first location that matches will be selected. Apparently, you can specify an additional criteria based on the minimum and maximum version of the component to filter out some locations. A long time ago, IIRC, you could also state that the user would be allowed to select the best location. is this documented somewhere? I really appreciate your sense of humor. Considering that the PackageMaker 3 documentation is mostly made of 4 screenshots surrounded by text (and that you have to launch the Xcode just to access it), that the Software Delivery Guide refers to the Tiger version of PackageMaker, that the Distribution Definition Reference documentation is incomplete, that the package format lacks a proper documentation (forget about overwrite-permissions), that the Installer Javascript Reference is missing good examples, it would be surprising if something as esoteric as relocators would be documented. The sad reality about the state of the installer tools is starting to sink in... the new PackageMaker looks really good on the surface. However it still seems to need a lot of work. To get information about relocators, you would need to look into old OS releases (Panther, Jaguar) and release notes. Documentation is a foreign word when it comes to Installation. This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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Re: PackageMaker 3.0.1 and requirement script
by Steven Meyer 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com Domainkey-signature: a=rsa-sha1; q=dns; c=nofws; s=dk20050327; d=earthlink.net; b=G0aNt4nmQ1GcxJbgrFI4gU5X10SQFayqLF4c6SbMJ3lcCqOlaWk79YLSRezS+lbm; h=Received:In-Reply-To:References:Mime-Version:Content-Type:Message-Id:Content-Transfer-Encoding:Cc:From:Subject:Date:To:X-Mailer:X-ELNK-Trace:X-Originating-IP; Thank you for your reply. Steve Meyer On Mar 3, 2008, at 5:54 PM, Stéphane Sudre wrote: On Mar 3, 2008, at 7:33 PM, Steven Meyer wrote: I'll describe my problems more specifically So, How do I put my script in content/resources? Or any other solution would be fine. // no iTunes = install if ( !plist ) { return true; } _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… Manually or through a shell script (which would mean, you may need to build your package/distribution script through the PackageMaker command line). I have only extensively used the latest PackageMaker. The packages produced can not be viewed in the finder with "Show Package Contents". If by manually, you mean "Raw Editing Mode" I am not sure if that was working. Adding a Plugin Folder in raw editing mode does work. This is all academic. I'm not going to try anything more complicated than the ITunes check. As for "System.run", when "Script for Target" is selected, PackageMaker generates a javascript function call which uses System.run. It can be viewed in Distribution.dist in Raw Editing Mode. When I tried calling System.run from my own javascript, I got a could not launch error. I am having difficulties running a shell script from the Requirements of an installer distribution. How do I add a shell script to a distribution package so that it will be run in the requirements? This is packagemaker 3.0.1. I am selecting "script for target "in the requirements. My script is exiting 0, but the check fails. Looking at "Distribution.dist" in raw editing mode, I see a javascript routine defined. function pm_volume_check() { if(!(system.run('/Users/stevenmeyer/scripts/check_target.sh') == true)) { my.result.title = 'Failure'; my.result.message = 'Cannot install to volume'; my.result.type = 'Fatal'; return false; } return true; } in the documentation system.run returns the exit code of the script, so the statement "(system.run('/Users/stevenmeyer/scripts/check_target.sh') == true)" is wrong. Exiting with 1, however gets a passed requirement check. That problem dealt with, I find another which stumps me. The absolute path of the script is coded into the javascript. system.run looks for a script in the the /content/Resources/ . I add scripts to the Resources folder in raw editing mode but javascript does not find them. If I knew the installers path while in javascript, I could perhaps work around this by calling my script with an absolute path. Looking in the documentation, I find nothing about installer path while in javascript. Manually or through a shell script (which would mean, you may need to build your package/distribution script through the PackageMaker command line). or How can I find the installer path in javascript so that I can call script placed elsewhere? I am trying to discover if photoshop is on a volume, where it is and what version. I can handle that pretty much from the shell. I do not know how to do this from javascript. I haven't found a public distribution script from Apple that uses system.run so far. But maybe you could just be as cheap as the iTunes distribution script. It only check for the presence of iTunes in /Applications. function VolumeCheck() { // do not downgrade var plist = system.files.plistAtPath("/Applications/iTunes.app/Contents/ Info.plist"); if ( plist.CFBundleShortVersionString && (system.compareVersions(plist.CFBundleShortVersionString, '7.6.1') != 1) ) { return true; } my.result.message = system.localizedStringWithFormat('isDowngrade'); my.result.type = 'Fatal'; return false; } Of course, it's cheap. But hey, it's been distributed to thousands of users and it hasn't made oceans rise. I would have thought that maybe it could be possible to locate the application through the JavaScript extensions but it only deals with running applications. And it doesn't seem like you could use a {token} for the path (or maybe you can but since this is not documented, there's no way to know about it). This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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postinstall script still failing
by Jim Hoyt 04 Mar '08

04 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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Re: PackageMaker 3.0.1 and requirement script
by Stéphane Sudre 03 Mar '08

03 Mar '08

site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com Delivered-To: installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com On Mar 3, 2008, at 7:33 PM, Steven Meyer wrote: I'll describe my problems more specifically So, How do I put my script in content/resources? Or any other solution would be fine. // no iTunes = install if ( !plist ) { return true; } _______________________________________________ Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored. Installer-dev mailing list (Installer-dev(a)lists.apple.com) Help/Unsubscribe/Update your Subscription: http://lists.apple.com/mailman/options/installer-dev/site_archiver%40lists.… I am having difficulties running a shell script from the Requirements of an installer distribution. How do I add a shell script to a distribution package so that it will be run in the requirements? This is packagemaker 3.0.1. I am selecting "script for target "in the requirements. My script is exiting 0, but the check fails. Looking at "Distribution.dist" in raw editing mode, I see a javascript routine defined. function pm_volume_check() { if(!(system.run('/Users/stevenmeyer/scripts/check_target.sh') == true)) { my.result.title = 'Failure'; my.result.message = 'Cannot install to volume'; my.result.type = 'Fatal'; return false; } return true; } in the documentation system.run returns the exit code of the script, so the statement "(system.run('/Users/stevenmeyer/scripts/ check_target.sh') == true)" is wrong. Exiting with 1, however gets a passed requirement check. That problem dealt with, I find another which stumps me. The absolute path of the script is coded into the javascript. system.run looks for a script in the the /content/Resources/ . I add scripts to the Resources folder in raw editing mode but javascript does not find them. If I knew the installers path while in javascript, I could perhaps work around this by calling my script with an absolute path. Looking in the documentation, I find nothing about installer path while in javascript. Manually or through a shell script (which would mean, you may need to build your package/distribution script through the PackageMaker command line). or How can I find the installer path in javascript so that I can call script placed elsewhere? I am trying to discover if photoshop is on a volume, where it is and what version. I can handle that pretty much from the shell. I do not know how to do this from javascript. I haven't found a public distribution script from Apple that uses system.run so far. But maybe you could just be as cheap as the iTunes distribution script. It only check for the presence of iTunes in /Applications. function VolumeCheck() { // do not downgrade var plist = system.files.plistAtPath("/Applications/ iTunes.app/Contents/Info.plist"); if ( plist.CFBundleShortVersionString && (system.compareVersions(plist.CFBundleShortVersionString, '7.6.1') != 1) ) { return true; } my.result.message = system.localizedStringWithFormat ('isDowngrade'); my.result.type = 'Fatal'; return false; } Of course, it's cheap. But hey, it's been distributed to thousands of users and it hasn't made oceans rise. I would have thought that maybe it could be possible to locate the application through the JavaScript extensions but it only deals with running applications. And it doesn't seem like you could use a {token} for the path (or maybe you can but since this is not documented, there's no way to know about it). This email sent to site_archiver(a)lists.apple.com

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