2c considerations about win installer

2c considerations about win installer

[andrea valle]

Dear all,
I'm using conTeXt to create automatic documentation about sound 
classification. The idea is that starting from an html file collecting 
infos about sounds my program can generate some schematic images using 
R and POV-Ray and to create a conTeXt file including both images  and 
textual information.

Now, I'd like to share this work with my students. I'm on macosx, 
they're typically on win. My program is in python so it's 
cross-platform, so no problem. Obviously they can annotate sounds,  
generate images and include them manually in a MS word file. But I'd 
prefer that they compile the conTeXt file.

On two win machines I tried to install conTeXt using the complete 
package (shipped with Scite: nice). I had always (different) troubles 
(on each machine) with environment variable (e.g. for Perl): actually 
I'm not able to run conTeXt.

Hacking a bit, eventually asking the list, I think I will solve the 
problem. But I don't think that my students can do, as I suspect that 
they probably not even know what is PATH. And I cannot help them on 
each installation.

So, more generally, I was asking myself if it would not be possible 
(and better) to have an .exe installer as usual happens in win, 
including Perl, maybe Ruby (+ or- 20 Mb doesn't change too much). 
Double click, and it set ups all the installation parameters. A 
completely autonomous installer would allow many people to try, use  
and  get fond conTeXt (and maybe to leave Word) without having to 
struggle with problems which typically lead people to leave out.

It seems to me that a similar installer would be a refinement in the 
spirit of the actual mswincontext distro.
At the end, it's not that far form Gerben's distro on macosx. It does 
everything for me...
Or maybe am I missing something?

Just my 2 c

Best

-a-



Andrea Valle
DAMS - Facoltà di Scienze della Formazione
Università degli Studi di Torino
http://www.semiotiche.it/andrea
andrea.valle@unito.it

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[Jilani Khaldi]

>So, more generally, I was asking myself if it would not be possible 
>(and better) to have an .exe installer as usual happens in win, 
>including Perl, maybe Ruby (+ or- 20 Mb doesn't change too much). 
>Double click, and it set ups all the installation parameters. A 
>completely autonomous installer would allow many people to try, use  
>and  get fond conTeXt (and maybe to leave Word) without having to 
>struggle with problems which typically lead people to leave out.
>
>It seems to me that a similar installer would be a refinement in the 
>spirit of the actual mswincontext distro.
>At the end, it's not that far form Gerben's distro on macosx. It does 
>everything for me...
>Or maybe am I missing something?
>
>  
>
No, nothing; and it is very easy to do it, above all when it could be 
done with Ruby using the "gem" installation. You can install and update 
ConTeXt with a single comand controlling indipendies and everything else 
needed. It is also very easy using "InnoSetup" 
(http://www.jrsoftware.org/isdl.php).
Cheers,
jk

--
Jilani KHALDI
http://jkhaldi.oltrelinux.com

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[Hans Hagen]

Jilani Khaldi wrote:
>> So, more generally, I was asking myself if it would not be possible 
>> (and better) to have an .exe installer as usual happens in win, 
>> including Perl, maybe Ruby (+ or- 20 Mb doesn't change too much). 
>> Double click, and it set ups all the installation parameters. A 
>> completely autonomous installer would allow many people to try, use  
>> and  get fond conTeXt (and maybe to leave Word) without having to 
>> struggle with problems which typically lead people to leave out.
>>
>> It seems to me that a similar installer would be a refinement in the 
>> spirit of the actual mswincontext distro.
>> At the end, it's not that far form Gerben's distro on macosx. It does 
>> everything for me...
>> Or maybe am I missing something?
>>
>>  
>>
>>     
> No, nothing; and it is very easy to do it, above all when it could be 
> done with Ruby using the "gem" installation. You can install and update 
> ConTeXt with a single comand controlling indipendies and everything else 
> needed. It is also very easy using "InnoSetup" 
> (http://www.jrsoftware.org/isdl.php).
>   
>texsync
TeXSync | version 1.1.1 - 2002/2004 - PRAGMA ADE/POD

TeXSync | --address     adress of repository (www.pragma-ade)
TeXSync | --destination destination of tree (kpsewhich)
TeXSync | --force       confirm action
TeXSync | --full        download everything (all binaries)
TeXSync | --list        list available trees
TeXSync | --make        remake formats
TeXSync | --terse       download as less as possible (esp binaries)
TeXSync | --tree        tree to synchronize (tex)
TeXSync | --update      update installed tree
TeXSync | --user        user account (guest)

this will sync the minimal distribution 

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                          Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
              Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
     tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                             | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[Mojca Miklavec]

On 4/21/06, Jilani Khaldi wrote:
>
> >So, more generally, I was asking myself if it would not be possible
> >(and better) to have an .exe installer as usual happens in win,
> >including Perl, maybe Ruby (+ or- 20 Mb doesn't change too much).
> >Double click, and it set ups all the installation parameters. A
> >completely autonomous installer would allow many people to try, use
> >and  get fond conTeXt (and maybe to leave Word) without having to
> >struggle with problems which typically lead people to leave out.
> >
> >It seems to me that a similar installer would be a refinement in the
> >spirit of the actual mswincontext distro.
> >At the end, it's not that far form Gerben's distro on macosx. It does
> >everything for me...
> >Or maybe am I missing something?
>
> No, nothing; and it is very easy to do it, above all when it could be
> done with Ruby using the "gem" installation.

Have you already done that? If it's easy to do it, I think that there
would be many users would be really thankful if someone would have
written an one-click-installer.

MikTeX developer doesn't listen too much to requests from ConTeXt
users (although he does a marvellous job with MikTeX otherwise and has
enough of other things to do). But if I don't count the troubles
connected with not-so-good-support for ConTeXt in MikTeX, it stil
remains one of the easiest ways to install and update it.

It's staightforward to install standolne-ConTeXt, but not for
beginners and those having almost no knowledge about computers. An
installation .exe would be warmly welcome.

Mojca


> You can install and update
> ConTeXt with a single comand controlling indipendies and everything else
> needed. It is also very easy using "InnoSetup"
> (http://www.jrsoftware.org/isdl.php).
> Cheers,
> jk

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[andrea valle]

>
> It's staightforward to install standolne-ConTeXt, but not for
> beginners and those having almost no knowledge about computers. An
> installation .exe would be warmly welcome.
>

Thanks Mojca, that's exactly what I was thinking.

Best

-a-

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[Hans Hagen]

andrea valle wrote:
>> It's staightforward to install standolne-ConTeXt, but not for
>> beginners and those having almost no knowledge about computers. An
>> installation .exe would be warmly welcome.
>>
>>     
>
> Thanks Mojca, that's exactly what I was thinking.
>
>   
i can make an ino base installer once i have 

- a faster machine with also more disk space 
- a faster outgoing line (currently 8000/1000) 

Hans 


-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                          Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
              Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
     tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                             | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[andrea valle]

(Hans, I wasn't saying you *have* to do it : I'm already impressed by 
your actual amount of work, it's enough for me :-) )

Best

-a-

On 23 Apr 2006, at 18:12, Hans Hagen wrote:

> andrea valle wrote:
>>> It's staightforward to install standolne-ConTeXt, but not for
>>> beginners and those having almost no knowledge about computers. An
>>> installation .exe would be warmly welcome.
>>>
>>>
>>
>> Thanks Mojca, that's exactly what I was thinking.
>>
>>
> i can make an ino base installer once i have
>
> - a faster machine with also more disk space
> - a faster outgoing line (currently 8000/1000)
>
> Hans
>
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
>                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
>               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
>      tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
>                                              | www.pragma-pod.nl
> -----------------------------------------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> ntg-context mailing list
> ntg-context@ntg.nl
> http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
>
>
Andrea Valle
DAMS - Facoltà di Scienze della Formazione
Università degli Studi di Torino
http://www.semiotiche.it/andrea
andrea.valle@unito.it

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[Hans Hagen]

Mojca Miklavec wrote:
>
> MikTeX developer doesn't listen too much to requests from ConTeXt
> users (although he does a marvellous job with MikTeX otherwise and has
> enough of other things to do). But if I don't count the troubles
> connected with not-so-good-support for ConTeXt in MikTeX, it stil
> remains one of the easiest ways to install and update it.
>   
supporting miktex is not so much a problem but i cannot get multiple 
trees working (config is not flexible enough, more or less hard coded 
paths and so)

if i drown in free time i'll have a further look (newtexexec already 
should be better)

Hans

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                          Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
              Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
     tel: 038 477 53 69 | fax: 038 477 53 74 | www.pragma-ade.com
                                             | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[olivier]

On Fri, 21 Apr 2006 01:33:04 +0200, andrea valle wrote:

> Dear all,
> I'm using conTeXt to create automatic documentation about sound 
> classification. The idea is that starting from an html file collecting 
> infos about sounds my program can generate some schematic images using 
> R and POV-Ray and to create a conTeXt file including both images  and 
> textual information.
> 
> Now, I'd like to share this work with my students. I'm on macosx, 
> they're typically on win. My program is in python so it's 
> cross-platform, so no problem. Obviously they can annotate sounds,  
> generate images and include them manually in a MS word file. But I'd 
> prefer that they compile the conTeXt file.
> 
> On two win machines I tried to install conTeXt using the complete 
> package (shipped with Scite: nice). I had always (different) troubles 
> (on each machine) with environment variable (e.g. for Perl): actually 
> I'm not able to run conTeXt.
> 
> Hacking a bit, eventually asking the list, I think I will solve the 
> problem. But I don't think that my students can do, as I suspect that 
> they probably not even know what is PATH. And I cannot help them on 
> each installation.
> 
> So, more generally, I was asking myself if it would not be possible 
> (and better) to have an .exe installer as usual happens in win, 
> including Perl, maybe Ruby (+ or- 20 Mb doesn't change too much). 
> Double click, and it set ups all the installation parameters. A 
> completely autonomous installer would allow many people to try, use  
> and  get fond conTeXt (and maybe to leave Word) without having to 
> struggle with problems which typically lead people to leave out.
> 
> It seems to me that a similar installer would be a refinement in the 
> spirit of the actual mswincontext distro.
> At the end, it's not that far form Gerben's distro on macosx. It does 
> everything for me...
> Or maybe am I missing something?
> 
> Just my 2 c
> 
> Best
> 
> -a-
> 
> 
> 
> Andrea Valle
> DAMS - Facoltà di Scienze della Formazione
> Università degli Studi di Torino
> http://www.semiotiche.it/andrea
> andrea.valle@unito.it

If I'm not wrong,

If you go on http://www.pragma-ade.com/dir/context/install/ (click
documents > directory view > context > install), you will find that the
bigger *.zip (cdwincontext.zip) contains Perl & Ruby, while
mswincontext.zip no. So you can run Context out of the box with
cdwincontext. (untested, because I got Perl & Ruby already)

Your students can also install Ruby (single click .exe
 : Rubyinstaller from
 : http://rubyforge.org/frs/download.php/9417/ruby184-16_rc1.exe) 
and Perl (single click .exe : activePerl
:http://www.activestate.com/Products/ActivePerl/) whithout any pb's of
adding new executables to the path, since it's done while installation. 

Cheers

-- 
olivier Turlier

Re: 2c considerations about win installer

[Mari Voipio]

olivier wrote:
> Your students can also install Ruby (single click .exe
>  : Rubyinstaller from
>  : http://rubyforge.org/frs/download.php/9417/ruby184-16_rc1.exe) 
> and Perl (single click .exe : activePerl
> :http://www.activestate.com/Products/ActivePerl/) whithout any pb's of
> adding new executables to the path, since it's done while installation. 

Except that I found out the very hard way, that at least Ruby installs 
nicely for a power user, but doesn't change the path unless the 
installation is done when logged in as Administrator - which may be a 
problem in a multi-user environment.

Other than that, I haven't had any problems with newer versions of the 
MSWinConTeXt distribution (the one that unzips into 'isoimage' folder). 
I'm currently running the April 10 version from CD at work and once Perl 
and Ruby got installed into the path, the system has been really easy to 
use. [I downloaded the mswincontext.zip, unzipped and burned the 
*contents* of the isoimage folder onto a CD - and that's it, then.)

Yes I agree, it is harder to put a working ConTeXt into Windows than 
into a Mac where it was *very* easy, but with Administrator rights to 
Windows2000/XP, the abovementioned Perl and Ruby installation packages 
are no problem and after that things just work.


Mari
(multi-OS user, but best in Windows)