Mail Archives: cygwin/2002/03/01/20:37:49
Rob,
[ Our mails are crossing, so just know that I've read both the post I'm
replying to directly here and the subsequent amplification. I think we are
mostly just agreeing, albeit loudly. ]
>It did *what* ? How do you reproduce it?
Grumble. That must be an even-day bug, because when I went to try to
reproduce it just now, the mis-behavior was gone.
Here's what I remember. About a half-dozen package updates had been
announced since I last updated, so I decided to use them as a test case for
the new setup.exe. It (NEW setup.exe) downloaded the bulk of those packages
(including their source bundles) and then reported an error (a size
mis-match, if I recall correctly) and offered to download again. I say OK
and it downloaded ALL of those packages again, this time without error.
Then, for whatever reason, I decided to run through the download again from
the top, and NEW setup.exe it listed all those packages as requiring download.
All this was with my old trusty favorite mirror: http://mirrors.rcn.net.
At that point, I went back to the previous setup.exe (2.125.2.10) and
downloaded (again) and installed the latest package updates.
Sorry to alarm you. Sadly, at this point all I can say is that it could
have been cockpit error (occasionally I forget to switch the radio buttons
to one of "Download ..." or "Install from Local Directory") or it could
have been a glitch in setup.exe itself.
If more details surface, I'll pass them along.
More below...
At 17:06 2002-03-01, Robert Collins wrote:
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Randall R Schulz" <rrschulz AT cris DOT com>
> > >Randall R Schulz wrote:
> > >
> > >>I tried the NEW setup. Let's say it has some problems still. I'll
>switch
> > >>when the kinks are worked out.
> > >
> > >
> > >Okay, so when you said "how can I..." you meant "I know it's supposed
>to
> > >work, but it doesn't for me." That's a bug report. Thanks.
> >
> > Let me clarify. Once the NEW setup.exe violated some of my expectations
> > (like knowing enough not to download the same packages over and over again
> > even though they are right there where it put them the last time) I stopped
> > using it. So my attempt to shift- or CTRL- click in the mirrors list was
> > done with setup.exe vers. 2.125.2.10
>
>It did *what* ? How do you reproduce it? Where they (a) from the same
>mirror, or where you (b) chopping and changing mirrors with each run? If
>(b) then that is somewhat-expected, and future enhancements will address
>this. However, the goal is that you select *all* the mirrors you want to
>download from and then just use those again and again. If (a) then tell me
>*exactly* what you do to make it happen, and send the .log and .log.full
>from a couple of runs please.
>
>
> > >Using a REAL mirroring tool will insulate you from such surprises -- but
> > >if you're willing to deal with the changes in setup's behavior, good
> for you.
> >
> > This I don't understand. If Setup doesn't locally maintain the files it
> > downloads as a "mirror" of the site from which it downloaded them, then how
> > does wget or any other mirroring tool serve me better? If I mirror using
> > wget or FTP Voyager will I be able to install? I surely don't want 300
> > megabytes of files for their own sake or just to be able to say I have
> > them. I want a local package set that I can use to install. Since a local
> > script execution phase has been added to the installer, manual installation
> > is, it seems, not an option at all. I've never wanted to do so, but the
> > point is that we depend on setup.exe to do installation, so any manner of
> > retrieving the files to install that is not directly usably by setup.exe
> > for the installation per se is not very useful.
>
>You're more than welcome to help create the command line installer. One
>patch has been submitted, and feedback given, but no futher news has been
>heard. Likewise I've put qutie some effort towards making the engine of
>setup be able to run under unix, and when that is combined with command
>line parameters, there will exist a mirroring tool that understands
>setup.ini's and can run from a script etc. etc. And yes, setup.exe will do
>the right thing if you use wget or FTP voyager - always. We won't break that.
That's all very nice, but I'm actually completely contented with what we
have now. Let me be clear that I have no problems or complaints with setup
(old or new, with the now retracted exception described above). I'm very
happy with what you (all) have given us. Considering I started using Cygwin
with b18, you can understand that I have a fair perspective on the
improvements, including but not limited to installation support, over the
past several years. It's just that I have a hard time accepting the
repeated admonition that setup.exe is "not a mirroring tool" when clearly
it mirrors Cygwin just fine, for my purposes. I cannot see why one would
use it for any other purpose, and perhaps that's what you're trying to
forestall.
I certainly do reach for wget for all my general-purpose mirroring and
Internet retrieval--I love it!
> > I'm a software developer, too. I fully understand and accept the need to
> > keep one's options open. Ideally this is done by careful wording of specs.
> > I guess that doesn't really apply here, since we're not talking about an
> > API or any other highly formal (or very complex) specification.
> > Nonetheless, I'm more than happy accommodate such hedges and reserved and /
> > or (pre-) announced behavior changes (e.g., removal of the old
> > interpreatation of the "//" file name prefix in the Cygwin DLL). It would
> > be nice to know, of course, what the anticipated change is. Just saying
> > "Here's a feature. It's there in plain sight. Please don't use it." without
> > adding "lest you risk ..." is kind of hard to accept.
>
>I've not said that :}. Chuck didn't say that either. Paraphrasing what he
>said : 'don't expect setup.exe to behave like a mirroring tool'. And
>'don't depend on the setup.exe local cache dir structure to remain the same'.
OK, but if the "local cache dir" is not a mirror, as is commonly
understood, then telling me to use a tool such as wget that will produce a
conventional "mirror image" is asking me not to be able to install.
Either setup.exe "mirrors" the download site, or a conventional "mirroring"
tool is unusable as a substitute for the download functionality of
setup.exe. I don't see how it can be both.
>Rob
Randall Schulz
Mountain View, CA USA
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