Author Topic: BETA development of the FreeSpace Open Installer  (Read 44415 times)

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Offline Fury

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
I just tried to run the installer. At first I had trouble getting past choose a directory dialog after clicking browse. The UI would just freeze. On third try I just waited it out and eventually it became responsive. This is not good because on the first two tries I spent ages trying to kill the process, which simply refused to do so.

The installer also doesn't seem to support installing of retail FS2. I believe this is important step because all official sources for retail install do not support anything but Windows. And eventually even those sources, at least retail FS2 discs will become incompatible with newer Windows releases. It would be nice if I could point the installer to either retail FS2 discs or GOG.com FS2 installer and have the new FSO installer extract the source to install retail FS2 regardless of the OS used.

Apparently the installer also does not handle external dependencies like OpenAL. Hopefully SCP could move to statically linked OpenAL Soft (at least for Win builds) or let SDL handle audio as well. But meanwhile the installer should address this. Preferably by extracting OpenAL32.dll into the FS2 dir. Which however, is not going to work with wxLauncher... *sigh*.

I find it quite weird that cross-platform installer doesn't install the wxLauncher, the only cross-platform launcher we have. While I have my issues with it not being stand-alone executable like the old launcher is, wxLauncher is still the definite choice here as default launcher.

These two are in my opinion major cross-platform blockers and should be addressed.

As for UI asthetics, it's definitely very basic and that is actually good thing. Except for two things, the FSO logo at top does not properly resize along with resized window and the red/green lights are simply ugly. The logo can be fixed by boxing it inside a black background and centering it. The lights simply need to be replaced by something that doesn't look like 8-bit bitmaps.

I also find it slightly distracting that the UI expands all files under each mod and what have you, in both mod selection and downloading. This takes too much vertical space. Make expanding them optional and have total progress followed in the header.

Now, the next challenge is to update the mods since everything except FSO is out of date. But unfortunately once Blue Planet and possibly some other mods gets around to update theirs, the official FSO build won't run said mods. Is there any possibility of adding support for FSO executable dependencies? And let me be clear here, I think it is stupid for official mod releases to require unofficial FSO builds. BP should never have gone this route.

Another dependency issue is the mediavps, since mods may rely on several different mediavps versions.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2014, 12:24:17 pm by Fury »

 

Offline Goober5000

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
I just tried to run the installer. At first I had trouble getting past choose a directory dialog after clicking browse. The UI would just freeze. On third try I just waited it out and eventually it became responsive. This is not good because on the first two tries I spent ages trying to kill the process, which simply refused to do so.
This sounds like a problem with your file system, or maybe you're trying to install with a network drive.  The only situation where the UI should freeze is if your file system isn't responding.  That isn't something I can fix.

Quote
The installer also doesn't seem to support installing of retail FS2. I believe this is important step because all official sources for retail install do not support anything but Windows. And eventually even those sources, at least retail FS2 discs will become incompatible with newer Windows releases. It would be nice if I could point the installer to either retail FS2 discs or GOG.com FS2 installer and have the new FSO installer extract the source to install retail FS2 regardless of the OS used.
It's a mod installer.  It wasn't designed to install retail FS2.

I suppose this could theoretically be added to the FSO Installer, but it would be a rather substantial addition.

Quote
Apparently the installer also does not handle external dependencies like OpenAL. Hopefully SCP could move to statically linked OpenAL Soft (at least for Win builds) or let SDL handle audio as well. But meanwhile the installer should address this. Preferably by extracting OpenAL32.dll into the FS2 dir. Which however, is not going to work with wxLauncher... *sigh*.
There is a post-installation note telling you to install OpenAL.  The installer might be able to do it automatically, but I would need to find out what steps are involved aside from extracting the DLL.

Quote
I find it quite weird that cross-platform installer doesn't install the wxLauncher, the only cross-platform launcher we have. While I have my issues with it not being stand-alone executable like the old launcher is, wxLauncher is still the definite choice here as default launcher.
Well, the SCP mod config file doesn't include wxLauncher.  I'll ask the wxLauncher guys to include it.

Quote
As for UI asthetics, it's definitely very basic and that is actually good thing. Except for two things, the FSO logo at top does not properly resize along with resized window and the red/green lights are simply ugly. The logo can be fixed by boxing it inside a black background and centering it. The lights simply need to be replaced by something that doesn't look like 8-bit bitmaps.
I'll modify the logo.  As for the red and green lights, I had already mentioned this in the first post.

Quote
I also find it slightly distracting that the UI expands all files under each mod and what have you, in both mod selection and downloading. This takes too much vertical space. Make expanding them optional and have total progress followed in the header.
Well, originally they were collapsed, and it was requested that they be expanded.  You're just going to have to argue it out with Battuta and niffiwan.

Quote
Is there any possibility of adding support for FSO executable dependencies?
This is beyond the scope of the installer.  The various mods should include notes in their readmes or the More Info box.
« Last Edit: January 31, 2014, 02:54:58 pm by Goober5000 »

 

Offline General Battuta

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
The installer does need to handle OpenAL. We need to smooth out as many points of failure as possible.

 

Offline jr2

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
I just tried to run the installer. At first I had trouble getting past choose a directory dialog after clicking browse. The UI would just freeze. On third try I just waited it out and eventually it became responsive. This is not good because on the first two tries I spent ages trying to kill the process, which simply refused to do so.
This sounds like a problem with your file system, or maybe you're trying to install with a network drive.  The only situation where the UI should freeze is if your file system isn't responding.  That isn't something I can fix.

Perhaps Anti-Virus antics?  Fury, you can probably check that by disabling that AV as a test.  Dunno what else would cause that besides bad sectors or corrupt filesystem.  Well, full disk or disk fragmentation, but I'm assuming you would know if your disk was almost full, and fragmentation is handled automatically with 7, so.. -shrug-

Thanks!  Now update your install guide. :D

Probably over the summer, hopefully I will have moved and have unlimited internet again.  Sharing 10 Gigs a month with the landlord currently.  :ick:

 

Offline niffiwan

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
I wanted to try creating a mod config file, so here goes, JAD 2.21.

http://www.mediafire.com/view/xei6726f6uce42p/jad221.txt

It passed the validation test, but I'm not sure if I've got the rest of it correct.  Especially putting the files in the correct dir since the .rar doesn't have the files in the jad2-21 sub-dir.  Anyway, is there some way to test this without publishing it to everyone using the installer?
Creating a fs2_open.log | Red Alert Bug = Hex Edit | MediaVPs 2014: Bigger HUD gauges | 32bit libs for 64bit Ubuntu
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Debian Packages (testing/unstable): Freespace2 | wxLauncher
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m|m: I think I'm suffering from Stockholm syndrome. Bmpman is starting to make sense and it's actually written reasonably well...

 

Offline Goober5000

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
The installer does need to handle OpenAL. We need to smooth out as many points of failure as possible.
I've added OpenAL to the Windows configurations.


It passed the validation test, but I'm not sure if I've got the rest of it correct.  Especially putting the files in the correct dir since the .rar doesn't have the files in the jad2-21 sub-dir.  Anyway, is there some way to test this without publishing it to everyone using the installer?
No, but I can tell you a few things that are wrong with it...

1) Only the most recent FOLDER tag will be remembered, so if the .rar file creates its own folder, use just the slash.  (Check the information I gave mjn.mixael here.)
2) The files need to be specified relative to the FOLDER.  So the hash file should be jad2-21/jad2-21-core.vp.  (Again, check the post.)
3) You've swapped the order of the hash and the filename in the last HASH tag.

 

Offline Fury

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
This sounds like a problem with your file system, or maybe you're trying to install with a network drive.  The only situation where the UI should freeze is if your file system isn't responding.  That isn't something I can fix.
It isn't though. My PC is fully responsive otherwise, except in the java's choose directory dialog. It takes roughly 15 seconds for the dialog to gain responsiveness after it's button has been clicked on, meanwhile Windows and all other applications happily go on.

It's a mod installer.  It wasn't designed to install retail FS2.
Installing FS2 on linux, OS X or BSD is not straightforward and the installer prides itself on being cross-platform, hence this is something that also should eventually be handled by the installer. While at it, same process can be used for Windows because retail 16-bit FS2 setup isn't going to work forever. I am amazed it still works in 64-bit Win7 and Win8. For reference see: http://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=86110.0

Well, originally they were collapsed, and it was requested that they be expanded.  You're just going to have to argue it out with Battuta and niffiwan.
Well, it is a minor thing and more than that I wish the UI will be revamped after install procedures are fully functional and thoroughly tested.

This is beyond the scope of the installer.  The various mods should include notes in their readmes or the More Info box.
I imagined as much. It is really unfortunate that people have cried for proper installer for ages and now that they have it, there is no dependency handling for their unofficial FSO builds. Well, this can be sorted out if SCP comes out with another release soon to address the need for these unofficial builds and people stick to official builds afterwards. Hopefully we can avoid the whole "Read the readme for how to properly use this mod" situations.

Perhaps Anti-Virus antics?  Fury, you can probably check that by disabling that AV as a test.  Dunno what else would cause that besides bad sectors or corrupt filesystem.  Well, full disk or disk fragmentation, but I'm assuming you would know if your disk was almost full, and fragmentation is handled automatically with 7, so.. -shrug-
AV's not the problem and neither are the SSD and HDD I have.

No, but I can tell you a few things that are wrong with it...
Any chance for a config file generator tool? It appears syntax of the config files allows for too many mistakes when hand-made.
« Last Edit: February 01, 2014, 12:40:08 am by Fury »

 
Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
This sounds like a problem with your file system, or maybe you're trying to install with a network drive.  The only situation where the UI should freeze is if your file system isn't responding.  That isn't something I can fix.
It isn't though. My PC is fully responsive otherwise, except in the java's choose directory dialog. It takes roughly 15 seconds for the dialog to gain responsiveness after it's button has been clicked on, meanwhile Windows and all other applications happily go on.

OK, that really sounds familiar, and it might be a problem with java's file chooser dialog itself. When using MajaExpress, the thing would always choke up and freeze whenever I'd try to access the FS2 root folder. The problem went away a while ago though, probably after a jre update. What version/sub-version of java are you running?

 

Offline Fury

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
What version/sub-version of java are you running?
The latest Java 7 u51.

 
Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
There goes my theory then :/

 

Offline Fury

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
Please, please, please someone with decent web design skills offer to re-design http://www.fsoinstaller.com.

Or alternatively take the site off-line and keep the stuff in the FSWiki.

 

Offline Goober5000

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
I think I'm starting to know what MjnMixael feels like. :doubt:

 

Offline General Battuta

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
He's right, though, that site should redirect to an up-to-date Wiki page for now. We're getting too many people still trying to use it.

 

Offline Fury

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
That wasn't the issue. The webpage does point to Goober's installer, not Turey's.

The issue is that the design is from 90's. But at least it's not as bad as http://fsport.hard-light.net/website/, which is almost like Geocities bad.

 

Offline Mongoose

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
Does it really matter if it isn't all shiny, so long as it contains the correct information?  Functionality over aesthetics 4 lyfe. :p

 

Offline Fury

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
Naturally, but I would think it helps when random passersby who stumbles onto the site doesn't dismiss it because it looks outdated. First impressions do matter.

 

Offline The E

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
Discoverability is important too. It's got nothing to do with "shiny", it's all about "does this website tell me what I need to do clearly". fsoinstaller.com fails miserably here.
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Offline Goober5000

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
That's why I changed the front page so that the first two things you see are 1) a link to the installer, and 2) a link to GOG.

But I'd be happy to let someone redesign it.  Anyone with the relevant web design experience is welcome to PM me.

 

Offline mjn.mixael

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
Honestly, I say kill the page as it. Make it a single page, no subpages. Link to the installer, GOG, and possibly to the 'How to install FSO on whatever OS' threads. Possibly link to the relevant Wiki pages.

Give it a pretty picture, a quick description, the relevant links and you're done. Hell, I'll do that if that's the way we decide to go.
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Offline Goober5000

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Re: RELEASE: FreeSpace Open Installer, v2.0 BETA
I will happily punt the ball into your court. :D