Linked by Thom Holwerda on Mon 5th May 2008 21:00 UTC
Ever since I started using computers, I've been baffled by the relative clumsiness of installing applications. Whether we are talking the really old days (launching the Rambo game off a tape), the '90s (running Keen or using installers in Windows 95), or the modern days (still those installers, but now also package management and self-contained applications); it's all relatively cumbersome, and they all have their downsides. I decided to put my money where my mouth is, and come up with my idealistic, utopian method of installing, running, updating, and uninstalling applications.
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RE[3]: Locking still necessary
by Thom_Holwerda on Tue 6th May 2008 17:00
in reply to "RE[2]: Locking still necessary"
Member since:2005-06-29
Doesn't every program need a unique identifier?
How do you make sure that no two programs can have the same identifier if everybody can set up a server and name/tag the apps as he pleases?
How do you make sure that no two programs can have the same identifier if everybody can set up a server and name/tag the apps as he pleases?
They're not identifiers, they're values stored as an attribute. Even if you have ten billion million attributes with value 345, if they belong to different files, that simply doesn't matter.
RE[4]: Locking still necessary
by RandomGuy on Tue 6th May 2008 21:36
in reply to "RE[3]: Locking still necessary"
Member since:2006-07-30
Maybe I just misunderstand what you say but aren't all these attributes together sort of an identifier?
So you could have two files with attributes
program=paint
vendor=ms
version=4.1
patch_level=127
...
and if they contained different binaries it would be a big problem. You could, of course, add mechanisms like checksumming the binaries and so on.
But then again you'd need a central server/group of servers that tell the user that a program with attributes x and y should have checksum z.
Am I missing something?
Member since:
2006-07-30
Doesn't every program need a unique identifier?
How do you make sure that no two programs can have the same identifier if everybody can set up a server and name/tag the apps as he pleases?