I've been using your portable apps with satisfaction for some months now.
Your idea is great and works really fine, but there's a particular I can't work out, possibly a bug.
I always used (sucessfully) INI settings to change the directory structure because of my organization of data in the thumb drive. What happens now is: I can actually move portablewhatever.exe anywhere and store with it portablewhatever.ini, where i set the variables which indicate the right paths.
But while in the previous version all was working fine, writing relative paths, now it works "half and half". I mean it works for the apps path, but not for the profile path.
example: (portableGaim)
Directory structure
--------------------
GaimPortable.exe in: mydir
GaimPortable.ini in: mydir
App in: mydir\app
settings in: mydir\settings
GaimPortable.ini
----------------
...
GaimDirectory=mydir\App\gaim
SettingsDirectory=mydir\data\settings
...
with this simple configuration the program finds the application, but doesn't load my settings. The really curious thing is that if i delete the directory containing settings ( mydir\data\settings ) the app won't start saying "mydir\data\settings" not found, please check your configuration".
If I take everything back to normal situation (default directory structure) my settings load perfectly.So where's the problem ?Something has changed (in worse) since in your previous versions this simple nesting was working fine.
Hope this can help. Thank you.
Gian.
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You say it's in mydir, yet you still use mydir in the path. Also, you said the settings were in mydir/settings then you say they are in mydir/Data/settings
I'm confused.
----
R McCue
PortaBlog Home and My Website
And before anyone complains about the grammar, I'm so jetlagged that my
hands aren't even in the same time zone...
"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate."
Sorry, you're right: too many phonecalls received while writing!
That was only a error in typing, the correct structure is as follows:
example: (portableGaim)
Directory structure
--------------------
GaimPortable.exe in: \
GaimPortable.ini in: \
App in: \mydir\app
settings in: \mydir\data\settings
GaimPortable.ini
----------------
...
GaimDirectory=mydir\App\gaim
SettingsDirectory=mydir\data\settings
...
I Tried again to be sure. Profile doesn't work, without any error message, just opens app like it was a brand new installation. If i take everything back to original structure (I just move apps and settings out of "mydir")it works fine again with all my settings and accounts.
Tried again with previous version of portableGaim and works fine with either the first or second configuration.
Thank you again and sorry for the confusion.
I'll leave this to John, cause I don't have the latest version.
----
R McCue
PortaBlog Home and My Website
And before anyone complains about the grammar, I'm so jetlagged that my
hands aren't even in the same time zone...
"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate."
I hope you can find a solution soon. Your portable apps idea is just the best: the only bug I can find is this I exposed.
Seems that while the $PROGRAMDIRECTORY uses $EXEDIR at the front, the $SETTINGSDIRECTORY doesn't use that.
John, can you confirm this?
----
R McCue
PortaBlog Home and My Website
And before anyone complains about the grammar, I'm so jetlagged that my
hands aren't even in the same time zone...
"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate."
It's a bug in the current version.
Try this as your launcher:
https://portableapps.com/downloads/GaimPortable1204.exe
I think I'm simply going to have to pair down INI options and, perhaps, drop all alternate directory abilities. No one that uses INIs ever bothers to beta test any of the apps, and nearly all bugs found after an app release are within the INI options. If even 1 person had bothered to test, there wouldn't be a bug in the release. No one tested INIs with Gaim Portable 2.0 Beta 3 Pre-Release (which was up for 2 weeks). No one tested INIs with Gaim Portable 2.0 Beta 3.1 Pre-Release (which was up for one week).
So, since hardly anyone uses them and the few that do don't bother to help test, expect to see these features dropped in future releases.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
It seems like you are a litte upset about people refusing to beta test.
I only would precise that I've been away for one month and I just came back to my studio, so sincerely I don't feel like I'm guilty about it or something.
By the way, I think that dropping that feature is one of the worse ideas you had, since it is damn useful for a lot of people, I reckon.
In specific thank you for the link you gave me, but unluckyly that version won't work anymore with msn. And Anyway Gaim is the less annoying problem.
My little soho net has a certain kind of organization in data storage, especially concerning e-mails and bookmarks (read: thunderbird and firefox): I'm not intentioned to modify all my files organization just because there's people around refusing to debug beta versions. More because I'm not among them.
Furthermore, synchronizing the contents of various profiles from usb stick to main server has always revealed a big flop and a considerable risk of data loss.
My solution, I think, will be to find a way myself, as usually happens. Right now I'm going back to your old versions of portablefirefox and portablethunderbird, since they work well and do the job. As soon as I don't find a better way.
It's a real pity because I was beginning to enjoy your apps.
Finally, thank you very much for you attention and hope you're gonna seriously think about ini's dropping.
Cheers.
Gian.
Hi again John,
I misunderstood concerning the launcher: for luck I'm slow, but I can do it. So the launcher you gave me works perfectly, thank you very much for that.
Something similiar for other apps could be the solution.
By the way a step back on my last answer: I'm afraid cause I didn't want to be kind of aggressive with you, I just don't feel one of the "lazy users" you described and I insist in saying it's a big mistake to drop the possibility of deciding the paths for apps profiles; sometimes could be crucial.
Your portable apps project definitely rules.
Cheers.
Gian.
It's more a matter of it being a time thing. If there's not enough interest among testers in specific features... those features aren't going to be tested well... they're going to be buggy... and they're going to make the product look bad. This bug was up for testing for 3 weeks and no one at all tested the INI file options. Not a single person. Otherwise, it would have been found instantly. This has actually happened several times... and it's always an INI bug or an alternate directory layout bug. I've already decided to drop the alternate directory layouts.
Sometimes, the impossible can become possible, if you're awesome!
Isn't this the same thing we were talking about a few weeks back
I don't use any of these alternate directory layouts.
If it matters, I could release versions with it in for the people that want it.
----
R McCue
PortaBlog Home and My Website
And before anyone complains about the grammar, I'm so jetlagged that my
hands aren't even in the same time zone...
"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate."
Might be nice for those people to have one that supports it but have one that does not as the main included one. May be a small headache in the long run but keeps those people happy while the rest of us have something that we like and use.
I personally put all my apps in one folder on the root and then subfolders of each of the apps and keep my pstart and its xml file in the base folder. I don't modify any of the structure.
You have the right to remain silent. Anything you do or say will be exaggerated or mis-quoted and used against you.
You could have like IfFileExists ${NAME}Paths.exe RunPaths RunNormal
That would speed the process up a lot.
----
R McCue
PortaBlog Home and My Website
And before anyone complains about the grammar, I'm so jetlagged that my
hands aren't even in the same time zone...
"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate."
We're still going to be allowed to use the INI to use an alternate directory layout right? You're just saying the ones that are default in the launcher will be removed. If I'm understanding you correctly...
Okay, here's the thing. There's a reason most of your beta testers don't test INIs. A good number of users, regardless of their computer experience, will use programs under default settings for a long time simply because it's easier. The problem with the INIs is that the feature is buried six feet under; even if you open the readme, you have to go down quite a ways before it even mentions INI files. If a program works out of the box, that's good enough for most people.
A better solution than dropping alternate directory layouts would be to just make the INI file required instead of optional. This is how I did it when I made my multi-user PFF launcher. Not only does it greatly simplify the launcher code, but it also guarantees that INI-related bugs are caught very quickly--while still allowing us more advanced users to customize our directory layouts.
I can't stress this enough: I'm practically OCD when it comes to my directories. I'll stop using PortableApps long before I'll ever use the default directory layouts.
fatcerberus1
Is that Bruce?
----
R McCue
PortaBlog Home and My Website
And before anyone complains about the grammar, I'm so jetlagged that my
hands aren't even in the same time zone...
"If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate."
They even said "OCD"...
~Lurk~
~Lurk~
That was Bruce, I am sure he was just vocing his opinion on the important matter.
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Deuce {The Core}{Dev Blog}
Portable Software: Just the beginning.
Deuce
Portable Software: Just the beginning.