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RE: [p2-dev] RE: [equinox-dev] Does Eclipse support native installation scenarios?
|
Farokh, please enter an enhancement
request in the Eclipse bugzilla system for your touchpoint request:
https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/enter_bug.cgi?product=Equinox
(component: p2, severity: enhancement)
Thanks,
John
"Farokh Morshed"
<fmorshed@xxxxxxxx>
Sent by: p2-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx
08/06/2008 05:45 PM
Please respond to
P2 developer discussions <p2-dev@xxxxxxxxxxx> |
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Subject
| RE: [p2-dev] RE: [equinox-dev] Does
Eclipse support native
installation scenarios? |
|
Thank you John for your
clear and definite response.
We will continue to use
the update manager and its install handler. We actually have released
a product using that technology and were looking to switch over to using
P2.
At this point, I would
like to lodge a requirement to be considered for P2 going forward:
A new Touchpoint that provides a given string representing a command line
to the shell to launch a process immediately after the payload is downloaded.
Installation will wait until the process launched exists.
Regards,
farokh
From: p2-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:p2-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of John Arthorne
Sent: Wednesday, August 06, 2008 5:09 PM
To: P2 developer discussions
Subject: Re: [p2-dev] RE: [equinox-dev] Does Eclipse support native
installation scenarios?
There are a number of limitations in the current release (3.4) that make
it a bit difficult to achieve the effect you are looking for if you want
it to run on 3.4.0. First, we don't yet support installing a new
touchpoint in the same install operation that wants to make use of the
touchpoint. If you have your own touchpoint that you want to install, and
then install something that makes use of the touchpoint, it would have
to be performed in two separate install operations (likely with a restart
in between). I.e., the sequence would look like this:
1) Install the bundle that defines your touchpoint, and any prerequisites
2) Possibly restart depending on whether your bundles and the bundles you
interact with are dynamic
3) Now you can perform an install that uses your touchpoint.
I don't know if this is an acceptable situation for your product. This
is something we plan to support for the Gallileo (3.5) release (we refer
to this as sequenced installs).
Another issue is that the touchpoint code is currently provisional API.
This means it is not yet real API, and is almost guaranteed to change in
non-compatible ways in the 3.5 release. This could be an issue for you
if you want to support installation into both 3.4 and 3.5+ releases. Again,
we plan to convert this provisional API into real platform API in the 3.5
release.
Finally, we lack good tooling support in 3.4 for authoring touchpoints
and touchpoint data. This is not a show-stopper, but means you may need
to write some code to generate any touchpoint data you might need (data
that is passed into the touchpoint action at install time).
I don't mean to discourage you, but want to give you a realistic idea of
the effort involved. What you are looking for is possible in 3.4, but we
hope to make much better and simpler in 3.5. A simpler alternative available
to you in 3.4 or earlier releases is to use update manager install handlers,
which you can read about in the Eclipse help. We intend to deprecate install
handlers over time in favor of the p2 touchpoint mechanism, but at least
in the 3.4 release it may be a simpler route.
John
"Farokh Morshed" <fmorshed@xxxxxxxx>
Sent by: p2-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx
08/05/2008 09:46 AM
Please respond to
P2 developer discussions <p2-dev@xxxxxxxxxxx> |
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Subject
| [p2-dev] RE: [equinox-dev] Does Eclipse support
native installation scenarios? |
|
Thanks Susan. Before I delve into this, can you tell if, even in
the best case scenario, we would have to contribute code to the Touchpoint
stuff and hence wait for a feature release of Eclipse to be able to do
what we want? If this is the case, we have to make different plans
for our release (go to some plan B). We don’t mind contributing
code, but we also must make our own release plans.
BTW, should I be sending mail to both the mail addresses above?
farokh
From: equinox-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:equinox-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of Susan Franklin McCourt
Sent: Monday, August 04, 2008 4:39 PM
To: Equinox development mailing list; p2-dev@xxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: 'Equinox development mailing list'; equinox-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: RE: [equinox-dev] Does Eclipse support native installation
scenarios?
You can start by looking at:
org.eclipse.equinox.p2.tests - the plugin.xml registers two test touchpoints
org.eclipse.equinox.internal.provisional.p2.engine.phases - the Install
class defines actions that run before and after other actions defined in
the install phase. This is where the install related events are sent. Presumably
your touchpoint action would run in the install phase, so this is a decent
example for gathering some of the parameters that might be needed during
the install phase. The wiki page mentioned before documents other variables
available in the install phase.
Some things I'm not clear on without trying it:
- how the touchpoint gets installed in the first place so that it can be
run. I'm assuming you have to prereq a bundle that includes this touchpoint
and that this touchpoint would install the normal way.
- how errors occurring in the native executable are communicated back to
the user. I'm assuming the native exe is a "black box" and that
your touchpoint action would have to invoke it and wait for its completion.
Also, here is a wiki page (somewhat stale) for gathering use cases for
touchpoints:
http://wiki.eclipse.org/Touchpoint_Use_Cases
Please report back on any attempts/progress in this area...
susan
"Farokh
Morshed" <fmorshed@xxxxxxxx>
|
"Farokh Morshed" <fmorshed@xxxxxxxx>
Sent by: equinox-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx
08/04/2008 12:03 PM
Please respond to Equinox development mailing list
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To: "'Equinox development mailing list'" <equinox-dev@xxxxxxxxxxx>
cc:
Subject: RE: [equinox-dev] Does Eclipse support native installation scenarios? |
How easy is it to write a new Touchpoint to run some Java code (of ours)
after everything is downloaded? Any examples? We are sophisticated
plugin writers. I’ll read http://wiki.eclipse.org/Equinox_p2_Touchpoint_Instructions.
Looking for any examples and “extension points”.
Thank you for the guidance.
farokh
From:equinox-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:equinox-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of Susan Franklin McCourt
Sent: Monday, August 04, 2008 1:46 PM
To: Equinox development mailing list
Cc: equinox-dev@xxxxxxxxxxx; equinox-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [equinox-dev] Does Eclipse support native installation
scenarios?
Hi, Farokh.
Most (all?) of the p2 core team are taking their vacations right now. I
work on the UI for p2, so while I use the core API, I don't know the exact
state of the underlying implementation and what limitations are there in
3.4 as well as those guys do. So consider this answer as a bit of hand-waving
and later in the week someone can fill in more detail and your follow-on
questions.
>1) Is the use case above a “reasonable” use case in the eyes of the
P2 project?
The short answer is that the p2 architecture is exactly designed to support
scenarios like this. One of the reasons for building a new provisioning
infrastructure was to support scenarios that have nothing to do with Eclipse
plug-ins and features, and handle support for native installs, downloading
and installing non-Java artifacts, etc. etc.
>2) Is the use case above supported in P2 now?
Not without writing some code, and I'm not sure what else would have to
be done on the p2 side. The focus for 3.4 was to be able to replace the
existing update manager, so much of our focus in that release was on the
simpler Eclipse install scenarios. You may have read about p2's lack of
support for UM "install handlers." For 3.4, we simply ran out
of time to cover the more advanced UM scenarios. So while our architecture
supports custom installs at a much more granular level than UM did, what
I describe below may not have been tried yet, and there may be bugs/limitations/etc.
that we would have to fix for this to work. (The core guys could provide
much more detail about where we are at exactly...)
The basic idea is that an installable unit (IU) can define "touchpoints"
that run at different phases of the install process. p2 has implemented
touchpoints for Eclipse plug-in operations and some native file operations.
Third parties can register their own touchpoints.
In your scenario, you would define metadata representing your plug-in and
the native executable. The user selects the IU that represents your product
and presses "Install...". At this point, the user interacts with
the p2 UI (where any licenses would be approved and so forth). This causes
the plug-in and installation file, and any other pieces necessary, to be
downloaded (by virtue of your metadata defining the pieces that are required).
As your IU passes through the install phases, it goes through several phases
(download, install, configure). At each of these phases, the "touchpoints"
can be run. Your touchpoint would run the executable, thus launching your
UI. When your install was completed, the touchpoint would return and the
rest of the p2 phases would continue until the user was prompted for restart,
etc.
There is some documentation on the existing touchpoint implementations
at:
http://wiki.eclipse.org/Equinox_p2_Touchpoint_Instructions
>3) If not, will it be supported very soon?
The 3.4.1 and 3.5 plans are not finalized. The lack of install handlers
is a blocker for many products that otherwise want to adopt to p2. So I
would expect something to happen early in the 3.5 cycle, but I can't promise
anything until we have plan. Note that the API is all provisional in 3.4
and an important part of 3.5 is to work with a wide variety of install
use cases to make sure we handle them.
>4) Should we abandon P2 and use the old update manager for the foreseeable
feature and count on P2 to support this use case BEFORE the old update
manager is deprecated?
If update manager install handlers support your needs, then I think it's
safe to assume that our touchpoint support would support your scenario
before UM is deprecated. I would imagine that we would either:
a) define a touchpoint that knows how to deal with UM install handlers
in some backward compatible way. I'm not sure if this is possible or not,
depending on what assumptions were made by preexisting install handlers
with respect to the underlying file structure, etc.
b) define a specific migration guide that explains how to use touchpoint
actions to accomplish what was previously done in the install handler.
That said, if your product timeline allows you to work with us on this
scenario rather than waiting for it to be completed, it will help to ensure
that the evolving API meets your requirements.
I hope this helps...
susan
"Farokh
Morshed" <fmorshed@xxxxxxxx>
[IMAGE]
| [IMAGE]
"Farokh Morshed" <fmorshed@xxxxxxxx>
Sent by: equinox-dev-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxx
08/04/2008 09:04 AM
Please respond to Equinox development mailing list
| [IMAGE]
To: <equinox-dev@xxxxxxxxxxx>
cc:
Subject: [equinox-dev] Does Eclipse support native installation scenarios? |
Our problems with adopting P2 is mounting. I am starting to doubt whether
P2 in 3.4 is really ready for prime time or at least our use.
Use case: We want the user to launch our plugin’s installation process
by simply clicking “Install…” in the Software Updates view. This action
would download the plugin and a native installation executable (a window’s
MSI exe file). Then, the native installation executable would be launched,
user interacts with the native installation process, and upon completion
of the native installation process the installation of the plugin proceeds.
If something goes wrong during the native installation, or user simply
changes his mind and cancels, we don’t want the plugin to be installed
at all.
But it appears that P2 has no way for us to launch the native installation
executable.
We have also thought about launching our native installation executable
upon first use of the plugin. We certainly would not want to do this in
the plugin’s start method. That would violate the etiquette that plugin
start method take a very long time. So, we would leave this initialization
for after the start method, to the actual use of our plugin. But, what
if the installation failed. What if the user changed his mind and decided
not to install at all. How do we tell Eclipse that this plugin is “dormant”
and should be uninstalled by the user, you know, something similar to how
Eclipse behaves after a plugin start method has raised an exception. Looks
like we cannot just call the plugin’s stop method, the Plugin’s stop
method comment says “Clients must never explicitly call this method”.
I feel like we are between a rock and a hard-place, or totally missing
something.
My questions are:
1) Is the use case above a “reasonable” use case in the eyes of the P2
project?
2) Is the use case above supported in P2 now?
3) If not, will it be supported very soon?
4) Should we abandon P2 and use the old update manager for the foreseeable
feature and count on P2 to support this use case BEFORE the old update
manager is deprecated?
By the way, we will always have this native installer. Eliminating the
native installation is not an option for us.
If this mailing list is not the proper place to discuss this matter, PLEASE
tell us so. Thank you.
farokh _______________________________________________
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Susan Franklin McCourt
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Susan Franklin McCourt
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