Re: [XBoard-devel] Windows Installer

[Tim Mann]

On Fri, 27 Feb 2004 16:26:38 -0800, Mark Ioli <address@hidden> wrote:
> One more question regarding the behavior of the uninstaller:
> 
> Right now the uninstaller I created forceably deletes the install 
> directory, as opposed to only removing the same files it had installed 
> and attempting to delete the directory. Almost always there are user 
> created files that are still in the install directory, so the directory 
> deletion fails. This is pretty standard for the Install Shield 
> installer. Should we continue this or just completely clobber the 
> install directory? I have the initial screen of the uninstaller giving a 
> message in caps indicating what will happen, and to remove any files 
> they may want to keep before uninstalling. For me when I uninstall 
> something I want it to really clean up after itself, not leave anything 
> behind. But some people might expect the "directory deletion fails if 
> user files present" behavior. So I just thought I'd see what the 
> concensus was, I can do it either way.

I'm in favor of doing things similarly to other Windows installers,
since that's what people are used to.  Some people will probably try
uninstalling their old WinBoard before installing a new one, even though
they want to keep their winboard.ini file, engines they've installed in
the winboard directory, etc.

If I rememember right, newer versions of InstallShield give you an
option at the end to see what files were left behind in the directory
that prevented it from being deleted. (Well, at least it gives you the
name of the nonempty directory.)  If it's not too much trouble, I think
it would be good to list the remaining files, plus have a dialog that
says "Delete these files too? [Yes] [No]".

-- 
Tim Mann  address@hidden  http://tim-mann.org/