From: werner@rascal.ics.utexas.edu (Werner Uhrig)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.system
Subject: Installer can be your enemy...?!? (Re: TuneUp installation)
Date: 13 Apr 1992 07:08:49 -0500
Organization: CS Dept, University of Texas at Austin
Reply-To: werner@rascal.ics.utexas.edu (Werner Uhrig)
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu


	I have with much interest followed the discussions regarding
	the Installer:  my thinking is that it is a much needed tool
	to enable "the rest of them" to do system maintenance (who
	would otherwise not be able to cope with the complexities).

	However, what I find deplorable, outright damnable, is that
	the activities during the installation are often not described
	at all, or not well enough to make the equivalent manual
	process clear (for the situation where you might need to know.
	remember Murphy?!?)
	Rather the update process is simply provided as "white magic"
	made available to the user on a "trust us" basis; this can
	backfire tremendously, because there is simply no way to anticipate
	all the possible configurations into which the "magic" will be
	applied;  and given that the Installer does not provide a log
	of its activities (that I know of) or any details describing
	the installation progress, you can get "bitten" and never know
	to suspect it as the cause of your problems ...

	case in point:  Apple's TuneUp Installation.  Simply trusting
	the Installer to work resulted in "disappaointments" in 2
	cases to me recently;  in the first case, the new Chooser
	version was not installed in a System where the Chooser file
	was not present in the folder Apple Menu Items (for reasons
	unknown), which was "unfortunate," in that at some later point,
	the user needed it, did a FindFile and installed the Chooser
	file he located "somewhere" on the disk -- of course, it was
	not the updated one (which Installer failed to install....);
	in the second case, the Chooser file had been moved into a
	sub-folder in the Apple Menu Items folder (appropriatedly
	named  DAs-from-Apple); an alias named Chooser was left behind,
	pointing to the real Chooser file...  surprise, surprise: the
	Installer did not "get the idea" and again failed to install
	the updated Chooser file...

	now clearly, I anticipate people commenting 'well, if the
	Chooser file had been in the Apple Menu Items folder, as it
	is put there by the Installer when os 7.x creates it, then
	there would be no problem';   which is, of course, missing the
	point.  the point is that in a powerfully configurable system
	as the MacOS presents, especially with os7, the support tools
	must be both powerful and "smart" also!  And whereas tools
	with the capability of "no questions asked maintenance magic"
	are desirable, it is NECESSARY for the tools to have a VERBOSE
	mode, or power-user mode, and be smart enough to recognize and
	report "fishy situations".  It is otherwise reasonable to
	expect that the installation details be well documented
	(and a log be kept in the system folder somewhere of all
	system maintenance activities) so that the called-in trouble-
	shooter (or 'touring system administrator') has a chance in
	hell to cope with the problems he faces supporting an
	"unknown" machine ....

	It is NECESSARY that all software distributions based on
	the Installer come with documentation which explains the
	details of the "magic automatic installation", so that
	it can be duplicated manually, and the proper installation
	can be verified.

	It is also NECESSARY that the Installer utility have a verbose
	mode (just as ALL programs, but *ESPECIALLY* systems support
	utilities like DiskFirstAid, and similar, should have) which
	creates an installation log (displayed on the screen to indicate
	progress) saved to a disk-file in a manner that assures that
	sufficient data survives the "always possible" crash...  to
	pick up where the crash left you!!

	People who charge money for their software products ought
	to know such things, or have it drummed into them (by those
	whose money they have already gotten hold of)!!

	People who teach or supervise programming and do not make a
	"sufficiently big deal" about such things, should be

			Tared-and-Feathered!

Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.system