361–370 of 556 posts
Why do we still need to install stuff? Why can I run webpages just fine without installing anything? Installation shouldn't exist, at least not from the user's point of view.
Uninstaller should not exist. Installers should not exist either. Every OS should have a package manager. The name clearly implies what it does: it manages packages; this task should be left to a specialized software, not to the user. Linux distros were pioneers in this aspect and "stores" of the modern world are just a clothed versions of package managers. of course, a power user should should have the right to chan…
Yes, but the modifications that are possible are limited by what the API of the package manager provides. Like Windows Installer does. If that doesn't work you create custom install uninstall logic, which has the potential to be less robust/reliable than what the package manager provides.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's never a security flaw that a program running with administrator privileges is allowed to do something.
It's a security flaw that too many programs have too many privileges. Windows should have pervasive fine grained permissions like any other modern OS.
The shift towards protections from malware happened mostly as a consequence of Windows XP. There are now better controls, like assigning low-trust processes like a browser's renderer a low integrity level to prevent them from doing that. But it's also late enough that it's hard to rock the boat too much without breaking existing applications. Microsoft tried to make a clean break and offer more sandboxed applications with a user-friendly package manager (called the Microsoft Store) but this wasn't well received by app developers: most didn't use it at all, and those that did often opted out of the sandboxing.
Uninstaller should not exist. Installers should not exist either. Every OS should have a package manager. The name clearly implies what it does: it manages packages; this task should be left to a specialized software, not to the user. Linux distros were pioneers in this aspect and "stores" of the modern world are just a clothed versions of package managers. of course, a power user should should have the right to chan…
I find that Linux software culture also leaves stuff behind and leaves it up to the assumed system mastery of the user to clean things up.
Package manager tracks every single file installed by a package, preventing overwrites by other packages.
Strict permissions prohibit software from littering all over the place.
What are you taking about?
Do you want package manager to remove yourb personal data of it was created by an application your decided to remove?
Why do Windows programs need special installers/uninstallers? Why isn't this handled by Windows itself?
Windows has had an installer as an OS component since the late 90s (called Windows Installer). As a sysadmin I'd prefer apps use it. Many application developers do not. It's maddening. (Doubly so when Microsoft themselves don't use it-- newer versions of Office, Teams, etc. Microsoft suffers from too much NIH.) I get unattended installs and uninstalls "for free" when well-behaved applications use Windows Installer. P…
Often, as you mentioned, Windows Installer packages are wrapped by an executable (in WiX this is called a "bundle" because you may also choose to add redistributables like the C++ runtime).
However, what you see in installations like SQL Server, Office and Visual Studio is that the installers are bundles as well - of a large amount of MSIs that need to be installed and uninstalled in a specific order. A single Microsoft Installer package is transactional and can be rolled back on failure, but bundles are not as well defined and left open to the implementation of the bundle. Windows Installer does not reach beyond the single msi package.
Uninstaller should not exist. Installers should not exist either. Every OS should have a package manager. The name clearly implies what it does: it manages packages; this task should be left to a specialized software, not to the user. Linux distros were pioneers in this aspect and "stores" of the modern world are just a clothed versions of package managers. of course, a power user should should have the right to chan…
> The name clearly implies what it does: it manages packages; this task should be left to a specialized software Yes, but the modifications that are possible are limited by what the API of the package manager provides. Like Windows Installer does. If that doesn't work you create custom install uninstall logic, which has the potential to be less robust/reliable than what the package manager provides.
Why do we still need to install stuff? Why can I run webpages just fine without installing anything? Installation shouldn't exist, at least not from the user's point of view.
While there ARE some tools that require a more invasive "installation" process (e.g., VMWare Fusion), the overwhelming majority of Mac software is installed by just dragging the application bundle into /Applications.
(App bundles are just special directories, more or less, so you're moving more than just the file, but it presents as a single thing.)
To remove an app, you just drag that bundle into the trash.
This usually DOES leave behind things like local user data or preference files, but those are inert text files and don't impact perf or machine behavior in the long run. Users typically waste more space on cat pictures.
The tl;dr is that "installers" and "uninstallers" only exist because Windows needs them. I have seen MANY MANY FOLKS come to the Mac and be VERY confused by this. "But you NEED an installation process! This can't work!" Nope. Windows needs an installation process.
I joked, in the 90s, that despite all the monopolistic chicanery from Redmond, their real lasting awful legacy would be the degree to which they lowered people's expecations about how computers worked, and I stand by that.
(Something else not needed on sane systems: "clean up" software. If you don't litter the file system with files when you add a program, you don't need special utilities to run that shit down and delete it later.)
Why do we still need to install stuff? Why can I run webpages just fine without installing anything? Installation shouldn't exist, at least not from the user's point of view.
It more or less doesn't in MacOS, and has NEVER really been a thing. While there ARE some tools that require a more invasive "installation" process (e.g., VMWare Fusion), the overwhelming majority of Mac software is installed by just dragging the application bundle into /Applications. (App bundles are just special directories, more or less, so you're moving more than just the file, but it presents as a single thing.)…
Go to your Applications folder. Right-click any app. Click "Show Package Contents." Take a good look around.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I see no reason not to allow this. That's why people at Microsoft made those decision and not you. The most obvious reason would be to use the executable itself to back the memory which the comment you replied to already hinted at. Instead of loading the entire executable into memory on application start, you just create some memory mapping entry. As the code executes and accesses different parts of the executable, t…
I think maybe you should familiarise yourself with how e.g. ext4 works. You can unlink a file and have a process still hold a reference to the inode. This allows you to continue reading (or executing) a file which may not have been fully mapped yet even after its last filesystem reference is gone. There really isn't that much of a good reason to disallow deleting the files (assuming NTFS is capable of supporting a si…
Why do we still need to install stuff? Why can I run webpages just fine without installing anything? Installation shouldn't exist, at least not from the user's point of view.
You had to install a web browser to run those web pages.