Glimpse: Determine Windows packaging process for Glimpse

[TrechNex]

Ideally the build will be automated as described in #2

[bluikko]

Is there any possibility to have an MSI installer for Windows?

That would really make it easy for enterprises. I understand it might be further down the road since GIMP had only a disappointing .exe installer.

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

I can look in to packaging an MSI installer. I have experience using WiX to build installers

[TrechNex]

I am hoping we can do this in an automated way on our Jenkins build server, as in principle there's no reason why we shouldn't be able to cross-compile & package for Windows on a Linux host. I haven't looked up how to do it yet though!

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

WiX builds MSI installers via XML defintions, there shouldn't be a problem using wix automated @TrechNex

[justinhhorner]

I'd love to see the Windows build also be made available via Chocolatey as another method of distribution.

[pipboy96]

@justinhhorner This is a good idea, but not something average user friendly. Making it the only distribution method would not work.

[justinhhorner]

@pipboy96 Excellent point! To be clear, I do not want it to be the only distribution method, because indeed, that would not work. I want to see it be made available via Chocloately, but not exclusively.

I've updated my comment. Thanks for pointing this out.

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

We should not spread ourselves too thin. For our official distribution I personally think an MSI file should be all we should distribute, as we are mainly Linux developers and don't have too much time + resources to put in to maintaining windows packaging.

Though if anyone is up for making a third-party chocolatey script we'll be happy to feature it on our download page at that time. :)

[justinhhorner]

@Member1221 Yes, I totally agree. I don't anticipate we will distribute to Chocolatey on day one. My only intention was to say I would like us to provide that method at some point, if and when it makes sense to do so.

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

@justinhhorner as I said, such an effort will probably be third party. But if a third party script is high quality enough (doesn't contain malware) I think we'd be 100% okay with featuring it on our download page at that point.

[justinhhorner]

@Member1221 That sounds great 👍 Thanks for confirming.

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

I'll close this issue now as it seems we've found a solution that'll work for now.

[pipboy96]

@Member1221 Would discussion of updating method on Windows need a separate issue? I feel a good update process is just as important (if not more) as a good install process.

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

@pipboy96 WiX provides a decent system for updating application files so for WiX it wouldn't be too much of an issue.

We should probably at some point investigate making an update notification widget or something. But that's multiplatform and something we need to consider post-0.1.0

[pipboy96]

@Member1221 Is WiX's update process automatic or does it require some actions from the user?

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

It requires the user to download the new version and install it. It should then overwrite files as neccesary to update the application. It will also detect wether an application is newer or the same version as the installer's version and show actions accordingly.

[pipboy96]

To clarify, does downloading happen in user's browser/wget/curl/aria2c/whatever download manager or will Glimpse have some kind of downloader?

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

In the users browser, they'll have to navigate to the project's (upcomming) download page.

[LunaTheFoxgirl]

We can't drastically improve the installation process until we're in the hard fork stage, since we want to keep the amount of different code per platform low to avoid overhead when issues arise.

Once we're in the hard fork stage, we'll probably create an in-app widget notifying the user that a new version is available that they can click to download the new version.

[pipboy96]

Thanks for clarifying!