Re: GS on Windows installation report

[Wim Oudshoorn]

stefan@agentfarms.net writes:

> First, let me say, that I did not wanted to offend the GNUstep on
> Windows installation package as I really appreciate its existence
> :-) Treat my report only as a test of the current state of GS on
> Windows and as opening of a discussion.

No offense taken :-)  
>
> If it is not targetted at end users, then what is the point of
> having it if anyone can install MinGW + gnustep? Again, do not take
> that as offense here, just a question for thinking about it.

Oh, the main reason for the installer is the fact that Tom Koelman and
I are not "anyone".
Ok, I could do it but I tend to forget how it works
and the long MinGW instructions are not very inviting.

So this prompted Tom Koelman to create the installer.

> Do I describe the installer correctly if I say that it installs: "GNUstep 
> basic
> runtime for GNUstep servers"? Or what would be the best description of the
> installer?

No, it really is used as:
* Installer for programmers that program GNUstep tools on windows.

> Perhaps yes. But why only developers? I think that someone can give an 
> example,
> how can the end user use the installer... Is there any GNUstep non-gui
> application that can be installed this way?
>
> 1. install GNUstep from the windows installer
> 2. install application from another installer
> 3. run the application as windows service or something similar
>
> Is there something useable like that?

No.  Not that I am aware of.  For the product we develop
we have a completely different installer, which installs the our applicication
plus the bare minimum of GNUstep what we need.

>> * Someone write unambigious instructions on how to compile gui and
>>   back given that the windows installer has installed make and base.
>>   These instructions should be basically a shell script.
>> 
>>   This allows us to create an installer for developpers containing
>>   make+base+gui+back
>
> Is it possible to do that from official GNUstep installation
> instructions + MinGW README?

Last time we tried, it failed.

>> * After that we can create a end-user installer.
>>   However note that the end-user installer is not very
>>   usefull if there are no applications.
>>   So we need at least one application that can be packaged
>>   on windows.  
>
> Why no applications? "GNUstep Development Environment" has two! :-) I think 
> that
> is enough for the beginning.

Well, now you are talking about the Development Environment, I was talking
about the Runtime Environment.  And PC and Gorm are useless in for 
the Runtime Environment.

> Note that any usage of terminal should be eliminated. Therefore I should be 
> able
> to (at least):
>
> 1. install gnustep dev env.
> 2. open project center and create new application
> 3. launch the application from PC

I would not include Gorm and PC in the Development Environment installer.
(Using your definition.)  
Because Gorm, PC and gnustep-core have different release schedules.
However now we are talking completely hypothetical, because we haven't even
started building these installers.

> This reminds me, whether the installation instructions can be reused for any
> platform? I mean, use some kind of "instructions and process for creating the
> installer".

I don't understand what you mean here.

Wim Oudshoorn.