LyX Portable 2.2.2 Dev Test 2

Thanks for the quick response.
Cleanup items: Delete from App\DefaultData the dirs examples, backup, templates, & workingdir;
Enhancement & Reason for it: In Launcher\LyxPortable.init add a section
[Environment]
LyX_Helpers=
path=%LyX_Helpers%;%path%

The user now specifies the helper apps she has on the RHS of the = sign in for LyX_Helpers above (or leaves it as is, ie, empty) to assure portably that LyX will find its helpers in its path when they are required to be there. Eg, to use Sumatrapdf as the pdf viewer and to assure importing of Excel files (not just csv's) and to use Evince as, say, the postscript viewer (no nag screen like gsview), one may use

LyX_Helpers=%PAL:PortableAppsDir%\SumatrapdPortable;%PAL:PortableAppsDir%\GnumericPortable\App\Gnumeric\bin;%PAL:PortableAppsDir%\EvincePortable

One can then, eg, use SumatraPDFPortable in the the LyX menu Tools>Preferences>File Handling>File Formats>PDF (pdflatex)>Viewers.

observations/thoughts:

LyX_Helpers: This environment variable in the launcher is not only unwieldy on updates but, on a closer look, may be unnecessary as well. To have, say, SumatrapdfPortable available in the path for LyX, one simply appends to the end of the PATH Prefix box in Lyx's Tools>Preferences>Paths the string (sans quotes) "X:\dir1\dir2\PortableApps\SumatrapdfPortable" and clicks Apply, then Save as usual, where, say, "X:\dir1\dir2\PortableApps" is the drive-dir containing the PA files. Your FileWrites in the launcher will automatically update this LyX path prefix upon drive-dir change and the user will have no need of storing separately the LyX_Helpers (so they're not wiped out by an update to LyXPortable, as you noted) IF: (1) the undocumented variable PAL:LastPortableAppsDirectory in Data\settings\LyXPortableSettings.ini is available to the launcher as an environment variable and IF (2)you add an additional FileWrite to the preferences file to replace %PAL:LastPortableAppsDirectory% with %PAL:PortableAppsDir%. If (1) and (2) are both true, the user has all the benefits of the LyX_Helpers variable with none of the drawbacks.

Size: wrt the new installer allowing for additional languages in the install: Touche! However, the installed size, even for the default language of English, is still high by about 34MB. The culprit seems to the directory App\LyX\Resources\backup, which currently has in it some thesauri (German and Australian English) which would not seem necessary, though I may have missed something.

Thank you for the quick response.

(1)DefaultData
Replace "PACROOT/MiKTeXPortable/App/miktex/bin/" with "PACROOT/MiKTeXPortable/App/MikTeX/miktex/bin/" in DefaultData\profile\preferences. I missed this one previously by foolishly testing on a box with an installed MikTeX (Duh!).

(2)FileWrites:
A replacement of %LastPortableAppsBaseDir:ForwardSlash% with %PortableAppsBaseDir:ForwardSlash% is helpful but not sufficient; a replacement of %PAL:LastPortableAppsDirectory:ForwardSlash% with %PAL:PortableAppsDir:Forwardslash% must be done as well and should be done prior to the change on PortableAppsBaseDir but following the one on PackagePartialDir. Otherwise, despite the change of (1), LyX will not be able to find MikTeX in a joint move of LyXPortable and MikTeXPortable from, e.g., D:\ to D:\PortableApps. I tested that move and a joint move from D:\ to Q:\TestEnv\PortableApps and all looked OK using the FileWrites below, which are mods to yours using the preceding observatons (as well as avoiding all drive letter replacements until combos involvng them have first been done):

[FileWrite1]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\profile\preferences
Find=PACROOT
Replace=%PAL:PortableAppsDir:ForwardSlash%

[FileWrite2]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\profile\session
Find=%PAL:LastDrive%%PAL:LastPackagePartialDir:ForwardSlash%
Replace=%PAL:Drive%%PAL:PackagePartialDir:ForwardSlash%

[FileWrite3]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\profile\preferences
Find=%PAL:LastDrive%%PAL:LastPackagePartialDir:ForwardSlash%
Replace=%PAL:Drive%%PAL:PackagePartialDir:ForwardSlash%

[FileWrite4]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\profile\preferences
Find=%PAL:LastPortableAppsDirectory:ForwardSlash%
Replace=%PAL:PortableAppsDir:Forwardslash%

[FileWrite5]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\profile\preferences
Find=%LastPortableAppsBaseDir:ForwardSlash%
Replace=%PortableAppsBaseDir:ForwardSlash%

[FileWrite6]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\profile\preferences
Find=%PAL:LastDrive%
Replace=%PAL:Drive%

[FileWrite7]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\profile\session
Find=%PAL:LastDrive%
Replace=%PAL:Drive%

Thanks again for the quick response. I tried it out & it looks good. Also tested with RegShot & it looked clean.

Your inclusion of gsview (App\Ghostgum directory) seems like a good idea. Alas, even though Ghostscript\bin is on the path, gsview does not locate the ghostscript dll & complains about it if there is no installed version or it gets hopelessly confused & verbose if there is an installed 64-bit version of ghostscript. So it needs an ini file, which by default is stored in %userprofile%. To rectify, I tested the following mods on an XP box (SP3) with no gsview or LyX installed and on a Win7 box with an installed 64-bit gsview & ghostscript. All went smoothly.
(1)Add to the Launcher\LyXPortable.ini the following lines to the end of the current FileWrites section:
[FileWrite8]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\gsview32.ini
Find=PACROOT
Replace=%PAL:PortableAppsDir%

[FileWrite9]
Type=Replace
File=%PAL:DataDir%\gsview32.ini
Find=%PAL:LastPortableAppsDirectory%
Replace=%PAL:PortableAppsDir%

[FilesMove]
gsview32.ini=%USERPROFILE%

(2)Add the file gsview32.ini (see below) to the directory App\DefaultData.
(3)To make LyXPortable use gsview out-of-the-box for postscript viewing, add the following line to the preferences file in the DefaultData\profile directory after the line beginning with '\format "text2".....':
\format "ps" "ps" "Postscript" "t" "gsview32 $$o" "" "document,vector,menu=export"

The first few lines for the gsview32.ini file in the directory "App\DefaultData" that I used are below:
[GSview-5.0]
Configured=1
GSversion=910
Version=5.0
GhostscriptDLL=PACROOT\CommonFiles\Ghostscript\bin\gsdll32.dll
GhostscriptEXE=PACROOT\CommonFiles\Ghostscript\bin\gswin32c.exe
GhostscriptInclude=PACROOT\CommonFiles\Ghostscript\lib
GhostscriptOther=

[Options]
Language=en
.............

To get the ini, I did the following: deleted it from %userprofile%, executed gsview32.exe from the App\Ghostgum directory, copied the ini from %userprofile% to App\DefaultData, & edited the latter in the [GSview-5.0] section as appropriate, esp. for the GhostscriptDLL and GhostscriptInclude lines.

installer enhancement:
for the installer, let the user exercise some selectivity on the additional thesauri & dictionaries; as it stands a non-English speaker (rather, a non-English-only speaker) pays a pretty hefty 150+MB penalty in unused language files just to get spellcheck going in her desired tongue.

launcher:
will test with RegShot later; the pre-gsview-mods RegShot looked clean, as previously noted in another comment; current execution is smooth, works as expected; nice!

These are the lines I have inserted into the launcher immediately prior to the 'path=...' line:
;Optional, uncomment lines below per your PA files and needs:
; LyX_Helpers=%LyX_Helpers%;%PAL:PortableAppsDir%\SumatraPDFPortable
; LyX_Helpers=%LyX_Helpers%;%PAL:PortableAppsDir%\FoxitReaderPortable
; LyX_Helpers=%LyX_Helpers%;%PAL:PortableAppsDir%\GnumericPortable\App\Gnumeric\bin
; LyX_Helpers=%LyX_Helpers%;%PAL:PortableAppsDir%\EvincePortable
; LyX_Helpers=%LyX_Helpers%;%PAL:PortableAppsDir%\R-Portable\App\R-Portable\bin\i386
;
; Notes on the LyX_Helpers lines:
; The path for LyX is portably set within the PortableApps context so that
; SumatraPDFPortable can be used as pdf viewer (see Lyx Help>Customization)
; FoxitReaderPortable can be used as pdf viewer (see Lyx Help>Customization)
; Excel spreadsheets (not just csvs) can be imported (unnec. for csvs only);
; EvincePortable can be used as postscript viewer or as pdf viewer
; R can be integrated with LyX using sweave or knitr

she'spic'n'span; details follow

Details
(1)For the Regshot & test (2) of this post, I used an XP (SP3) virtual machine with no installed gsview, ghostscript, miktex, or LyX. Adobe's AcrobatReader was the installed pdf viewer. For the Regshot, the pre- & post shots were taken vis a vis the following action: exec LyxPortable by double clicking it in Windows Explorer (not from the PA menu), open a small LyX file, perform a minor edit w/i LyX, save the edits w/i LyX, export the TeX from LyX, view the pdf and postscript outputs, close LyX. Both LyXPortable and MiKTeXPortable were completely fresh installs from the pafs with no execution of MiKTeXportable prior to that of LyXPortable. Execution was from an admin account. Windows XP was completely up to date but Windows Update and other standard system services, such as indexing, had not been turned off, nor was the installed AV from WebRoot. Summary of the results:

(a)The execution from the admin account and/or the non-suspension of background System-level services resulted in 5 minor HKLM registry mods found: 1 by Win for the Cryptography Seed , 1 by Win for SystemIndex\NotificationLogCheckPoint, & 3 by the AV under HKLM\SOFTWARE\WRData for its update status, etc.
(b)All other adds, deletes, modifies to the registry were to HKU. These were inconsequential & all were necessitated by the mere fact of having exec'd Acrobat & WinExplorer: for Acrobat Reader's RememberedViews, WinExplorer's and/or the shell's common dialogs/Bags MRUs or Cache. No HKCU registry mods were found.

(b)Apart from the expected, purely LyX-related file mods (LyX file that was edited, the LyX backup from auto-saves, tex/pdf/ps/latex-support outputs, & LyX profile in the Data directory)and the inescaple Win file mods directly induced from the LyX activity (Windows Prefetch, Win logs, NTUSER.DAT), there were merely file mods from the Win background (SystemIndex-related), the AV (All Users\Application Data\WRData), and Acrobat(ReaderMessages, SharedDataEvents).

(2)Following the Regshot test, a copy of the (post-Regshot-execution) LyXPortable and MikTeXPortable dirs was made to a subdir of XP's SharedDocuments folder. No mods were made at all. LyXPortable exec'd flawlessly (from the same admin account, again exec'd from WinExplorer & w/ same action set). Ditto for execution from the PA menu.
(3)The post-execution, XP-based, SharedFolders versions of LyXPortable & MikTeXPortable were then copied w/o mod to a USB (under the drive-dir of 'D:\PortableApps')that was then attached to a separate Win 7 box, where smooth execution was again obtained from a non-admin Win 7 Guest account.

execution with out-of-the-box DT8, with no GSView, etc. installed, & from w/i a sterile XP_SP3 VM.

w/ DefaultData as shipped and w/ %userprofile%\gsview32.ini, if any from a prior execution, deleted, upon requesting a postscript view by LyX (ctrl+T in LyX), gsview reports that there is no Ghostscript on the computer. It also, creates a faulty gsview32.ini in %userprofile%. That ini has been constructed by gsview32 assuming improperly--despite the Ghostscript binaries on the path--that the Ghostscript binaries are in subdirs of GSViewPortable. No gsview32.ini should be exist post-execution at all, of course.

IMHO, the fix for this behavior is twofold:
(a)In DefaultData\profile\preferences, replace
\format "ps" "ps" "Postscript" "t" "gsview32 $$o" "" "document,vector,menu=export"

with

\format "ps" "ps" "Postscript" "t" "GsViewPortable $$o" "" "document,vector,menu=export"

(b)and delete (sans quotes) ";PACROOT/GSviewPortable/App/gsview" from the path_prefix in DefaultData\profile\preferences.

The second action prevents accidentally invoking gsview32, since such an invocation will necessarily be both non-portable & (if there is no gsview32.ini in %userprofile%) & erroneous.

Other TeX apps which rely, even optionally, on using gsview32.exe rather than gsviewPortable.exe will run afoul of the same non-portable & erroneous call issue as did LyX.

postscript viewing tested in sterile XP-SP3 VM; it works

see my post of October 14, 2013 - 12:09pm "LyXPortable does not convert to HTML--error from Windows" for how DefaultData\profile\preferences should be configured, in part. in the converters section; the basic issue is that 'elyxer.py' (sans quotes) in that spec. will not suffice; one must use the full path name of elyxer.py &, of course, scrupulously observe the syntax conventions w.r.t. quotes, etc.

";%PAL:PortableAppsDir:ForwardSlash%/Asymptote"

should be

";%PAL:PortableAppsDir:ForwardSlash%/AsymptotePortable/App/asy"

(sans quotes) shouldn't it?

sterile XP-SP3 VM environment:
tests on
viewing postscript with GsView,
generating HTML, HTML(Word), LyXHTML formats,
generating/reading pdf (of course)

all worked very well; will test further & apprise if see any issues;

good show;

thanks

2.1.0 binaries are up at ftp://ftp.lyx.org/pub/lyx/bin/2.1.0/, although yet to be announced officially. Would be great to have your paf updated. Thanks.

from "http://www.lyx.org/News#item1", dated April 25, 2014:
"We are pleased to announce the release of LyX 2.1.0."

This is a major upgrade. See the above-referenced news item and links therein for new enhancements available in 2.1.

The binary for the Windows installer (non-Bundle version, i.e., verion not including MikTeX) is located in the ftp directory
ftp://ftp.lyx.org/pub/lyx/bin/2.1.0/

and the file is:
ftp://ftp.lyx.org/pub/lyx/bin/2.1.0/LyX-2.1.0-Installer-2.exe

this thank you is long over-due, but better late than never.

GhostscriptPortable is in installed in the CommonFiles sub-directory of the PortableApps directory if you havei installed the PA platform, so another installation is not nec.

GSView and GhostscriptPortable are needed only if you prefer to view the Postscript output. If you always view the pdf output, then they are not nec.

Most Windows installations have Adobe Acrobat installed as a pdf viewer, so Foxit may not be strictly nec. Alternatives to Acrobat (and to Foxit) are SumatraPdf and Evince, for both of which portable versions may be found on the PA "Get Apps" page in addition to version for Foxit. A distinct disadvantaqe of using pre-installed Adobe Acrobat is that with each re-execution from LyX of the pdf generation Adobe opens up yet another window. This can get annoying. You mayt wish to check your pdf viewer's documentation--e.g., Foxit--to see how to set it so that it will re-use the same window when the pdf changes. Command-line parameters to the pdf viewer for such re-use (and other paramterizations) can be set within LyX->Tools->Preferences->File Handling. See the LyX Customization Help manual.

"Error converting to loadable format" when display graphics in LyX on figures in PDF, emf, jpg etc. Only works with native format ppm and png. Seems converter issue, the "cache" directory in "profile" is empty.

Works for local install with default userdir in .....\AppData\Roaming\LyX2.1.

I am lost after fiddling without success with path and Launcher.ini settings. Did it work for you? Help much appreciated, perhaps from d4winds also.

Hi d4winds:
I've seen LyX 2.14 downloads and have, in fact downloaded it. If I want to install LyX portable the files description says we need to have Mikex, Ghostscript and Ghostview, and Strawberry Perl (optional). So my question is what sequence to install these packages and which location to use to get a working portable Lyx?

In other words, my guess is that you install Miktex, Ghostscript and Ghostview to common and Lyx to its own portable app folder. Do I have this right, and if not, any advice as to how to install would be appreciated.
Thanks
Jojo