Re: Standarization WAS: gtk-devel & gtk-runtime: InnoSetup packages for MinGW/Win32

Hello all!.

Apart from the central repository, the most actualized one,
set up kindly by Tor

http://www.gimp/win32

There are some other more or less dispersed efforts, devoted to simplify
the gtk 1.3, or 2.2 binary and/or development distributions of GTK.

To my knowledge:

Jernej Simoncic

http://www2.arnes.si/~sopjsimo/gimp/

WinGTK

http://sourceforge.net/projects/wingtk/
http://wingtk.sourceforge.net/

GTK+ For Windows

http://www.dropline.net/gtk/index.html

May there are others.

I remember there was some discussion in the list about packaging
strategies at the list that some how converged in the way the windows
registry is updated in order to conveniently set up the environment.

Actually, InnoSetup and their family seems to be one of the most
convenient ways to package the mentioned tools, and if that happens,
it will be also one of the most convenient ways to package the
distributions that depend on such libraries. It seems most windows
distributions are using it.

It is clear that there are several ways in which the development
environment can be installed, mainly in what respect to the types of
registry keys that are modified, an also in the way that they are
modified.

All of them can be OK, but when installing an application that depends
on one of the above installers, the way in which the new installer
interacts with the registry can be dependent in the way that the gtk
installer was designed.

I think that the support for gtk (1.3 and 2.2) in windows is mature
enough, as to have a central or canonical place at which the easy to
install win32 gtk distributions live.

In my opinion, this place ought to be some page or directory
within

http://www.gtk.org

Evidently, could be convenient to have mirrors of that repository,
such should be listed form the canonical place.

In my opinion, applications build upon gtk win32 binaries, should
point  always, from their home pages, to the canonical place,
avoiding to supply their own copy of gtk.

In my opinion this would greatly simplify the installation process, an
then the spreading of gtk.

Following the reasoning, it seems convenient have at the repository, no
only the cutting edge windows binary installer, but also some other
previous versions, so that any broken functionality could be corrected,
by installing a previous version of the library.

At this situation would be nice that some installed versions of the gtk
libraries could survive installed in the same machine, and to provide
a windows register mechanism that allows the gtk dependent application
to dynamically link to their preferred version. Up to my knowledge the
methods that the InnoSetup installer are using are compatible with this
panorama.

I'm not willing to say that there is no place to other installers:

Nullsoft for example.

In my opinion there are some developing environments, GPLed
environments, up to my knowledge, Mingw and Cywin that are there.

They have an important presence, and also provide their own methods
for installing applications. It would be very nice to see gtk natively
hosted in such environments. (Cygwin hosting may need two or more
flavors, depending if it is using the Cygwin DLL and also depending if
it is using The X11 graphic back end or the win32 one, such compilations
have spotly have some degree of success within the Tor's gtk 1.3 or main
gtk 1.2 series)

Nevertheless, those (Mingw ang Cygwin ones) installation environments,
to my
knowledge, are not a reality at the moment, appart from the fact that
they can survive perfectly with the InnoSetup installer in what refers
to not ussing Cygwin DLL and the X11 backend.

As a conclusion: I think that:

1. The gtk 1.3, 2.0 and 2.2 Tor's page with their binary distributions
should live at http://www.gtk.org as a cannicla place. This tar packages
should be the main source for other binary distributions (if other
conflicts does no arise).

2. Each easy to install binary package (InnoSetup, Nullsoft), should
have place at the same page or set of canonical page.

3. The scripts used to generate the package should accompany the
corresponding installer, and the way the register is affected  by the
installation should clearly stated at the same place. It wuld be nice
that those installers builds cleanly from the tar binary standar
packages. Also, the way other applications should look the register in
order to look for a previously installed gtk binary should be stated. In
this sense
the instructions provides at http://www.dropline.net/gtk/index.html
are wonderfull.

4. It is very common to see the library packages divided on: bynary
distribution (what it is needed to run an application that runs uppon
the library), and the devel package (that contains what needs to be
added to the previous distribution in order to compile applications).
In my opinion this should be the correct way to deal with installer
splitting.

5. For library source packages it seems, that currently the CVS
alternative, is the most appropriate, although I'm not sure if LGPL
requirements would need deploy such src  installers. Either case, I'm
not have a clear opinion in this subject.


I hope to have been constructive at least :).

Thanks to everybody by their support for gtk an their nicely 
packaged binary installers.

Bye

Javier Ros


El jue, 24-01-2002 a las 14:24, Romain Lievin escribió:
> Hi,
> 
> I post this because it may interest some users & developers...
> 
> I have created 2 InnoSetup packages (a free InstallShield-like installer):
> - gtk-win32-runtime.exe : install runtime DLLs for Windows
> - gtk-win32-devel.exe: install headers, pkg-config files, libraries for MinGW
> and some misc stuffs.
> It installs pkg-config too as well as the libiconv library.
> 
> This package includes the latest GTK+ libraries (2.2.0).
> 
> Comments, suggestions are welcome !
> 
> Regards, Romain.
> -- 
> Romain Lievin, aka 'roms'  	<[email protected]>
> The TiLP project is on 		<http://www.ti-lpg.org>
> "Linux, y'a moins bien mais c'est plus cher !"

-- 
Javier Ros
Dpto. Ingeniería Mecánica/Ingeniaritza Mekanikoa Saila
Univ. Pública de Navarra/Nafarroako Univertsitate Publikoa
Campus de Arrosadía s/n 31006 Iruñea
Tel. 34 948169307 Fax. 34 948169099


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