Opera Desktop Team

about:installer

By Johan Borg. Tuesday, 21. March 2006, 14:18:39

Thanks for all the valuable feedback regarding the network-ready MSI installer. Here's a link to the classic installer which we intend to keep until the new one can fill all our needs.

Classic installer

Please continue to give us feedback on the MSI version, file bugs and upload log files. We have already fixed bugs thanks to your help

Better late than never, right?Widgets UI improvements!

Comments

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YtseJam # 21. March 2006, 14:27

Any chance you guys will consider better solutions if all requirements were met?
I am certain you are aware of NSIS and it's various qualities...

As far as I can see, what you "miss" in it is network deloyment, correct?
Hopefully I will soon have a reply from NSIS's main developer regarding this.

Surly you must know there are better options...

niltsh # 21. March 2006, 14:27

Great Job!

I found Now there are always the two dirs in the opera's directory, "opcache" and "images" even I set the Cache Cirectory4 in the opera6.ini. these two will always be created when opera is opened.

gorg # 21. March 2006, 14:27

Thanks

Vladimyr # 21. March 2006, 15:09

Oh, at long last! I like this build, it seems it's working =)

mgillespie # 21. March 2006, 15:31

NSIS Installers are very nice, totally bloat free. The exact design philosophy that Opera have.

MSI however is bloated and a spawn of satan. I noticed Mozilla have seen the benefits of NSIS, and a moving to it. I understand Opera decision to move to MSI, to get network deployment, but are they risking alienating a large part of their home userbase, by using such a unfriendly and bloated installer?

kyleabaker # 21. March 2006, 15:34

why could they not market the software with both installers, targeting different audiences with each?

Svoboda # 21. March 2006, 15:38

The new installer is obviously a little bit slower, but still quite fast (the old one was done with the whole inst. within few seconds, maybe 20). It is a little pitty that the size of the installer have grown up, but I personally don't consider this that important. The truth is that the compactness of Opera was usually one of the advantages of the browser. So I hope it will be kept on the Opera's developers mind :-)

mgillespie # 21. March 2006, 16:12

Perhaps local and network deployments, 1 using NSIS, 1 using MSI.

Seems each has it's own advantages and disadvantages.

NSIS
- Does not do network deployments
+ Works on all windows OS
+ much smaller downloads
+ faster installs
+ users like it
+ Supports opensource community
+ Is cool

Installshield MSI
+ Does network installs
- Big and bloated
- need MSI runtime installed
- not compatible out of the box with all windows OSes
- slow installs
- users loath it
- repair/maint modes can be troublesome/annoying
- spawn of satan / uncool

DWz # 21. March 2006, 16:15

Cant you do a portable version, without installer? I simply dont get the whole install thing, everyone can creat a desktop shortcut.

YtseJam # 21. March 2006, 16:15

A thread regarding this has been opened in the NSIS forum, so it is sure to attract the NSIS developers, which might provide a solution for the network deployment issue.

http://forums.winamp.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=1891435

Opera, please re-consider your stance on it matter.

thexfile # 21. March 2006, 16:17

The Installshield MSI installed just fine on my XP SP2 system but, this NSIS installer can be used on a Win 95/98/ME system without any issues.
Less issues are better

kerios # 21. March 2006, 16:33

I seem to be having trouble displaying css styles, I am using the default user.css in author mode, however when visiting a page that I know underlines links when hovering over them, it does not underline with this version, I tried messing with the settings e.g unchecked "my style links" in "author mode" but still no go, am I missing something? ... am I the only one with css issues? ... any help would be appreciated.

sooqing # 21. March 2006, 16:46

This latest build breaks Gmail, the "long green line" of 'contacts' is back..

Anders # 21. March 2006, 16:46

I have the same problem with the textdecorations

olli # 21. March 2006, 16:47

sooqing: Known issue :-)

chesss # 21. March 2006, 17:00

Here's a link to the classic installer which we intend to keep until the new one can fill all our needs.

Now thats Operaish

payu # 21. March 2006, 17:16

MSI just sucks. This is my opinion.

dserl # 21. March 2006, 17:17

Thanks...

SirCasey # 21. March 2006, 17:25

If we must have an installer, it must allow us to install in a couple different locations so we can use multiple profiles...

MSI didn't let us do that, so thanks a bunch for the Classic installer!

~SirCasey

filbo # 21. March 2006, 18:14

Yay! Installed 8303 now; no install troubles. Thank you muchly.

I'm not personally averse to MSI, as long as it does what it needs to do (support multiple distinct Opera installs without disturbing the rest of the system).

But... if it's true that MSI is going to require a reboot. Don't Do It. I rarely even examine packages that require a reboot. Once the installer tells me that, it gets removed posthaste. Don't burden Opera with a rebooting installer.

Which is to say: if MSI requires a reboot, and you're really going to MSI, then never get rid of the "classic" installer.

You provide multiple Linux builds (static and shared w/different libcs) and packages (debs, RPMs, ?more?) -- seems like multiple Windows packages would be OK.

>Bela<

xErath # 21. March 2006, 18:58

I don't like MSI either. It's slow, and feels untidy !

Providing a MSI installer for networks or a smaller installer for other cases would be nice!

Phantom_of_The_Opera # 21. March 2006, 19:14

And I don't like strange threads with even more strange results.
Now I'm waiting for the release of IE 7 Final.

Licaon # 21. March 2006, 19:35

The MSI installer doesn't ask if you want individual profiles or not, it just installs them that way. I dont use individual profiles so thats kindof bad. 10x for the classic installer

YtseJam # 21. March 2006, 19:35

Phantom_of_The_Opera,

Chill out, this is a preview. Don't like it, don't use it.
Wait for the final and then pass judgement. Impetiant twat.

stewie # 21. March 2006, 19:36

I really cant see the problem with the new installer.
It's true thats is bigger and slower but I dont care as long it hopefully would improve the browsing experience in the future, and help with the programme's improvement. Opera team are trying hard to keep things evolving. If depended on some of you we would still use IE 5 or Opera 7!
Stop being such whining babies..!, honestly!

borg # 21. March 2006, 20:02

Licaon, in the MSI installer we give the users the choice between a standard install and a customized one. That's something we planned to do regardless of the underlying installer technology: One super-simple-just-works-version and one which allows the demanding user to finetune a bit, including the choice of individual profiles.

Another change that has nothing to with MSI as such is the icon on top level in the Programs menu, which we wanted to try since the Opera folder ended up containing a single entry anyway.

jrronimo # 21. March 2006, 20:17

I totally don't get what the big deal about MSI is. It worked perfectly fine for me -- /better/ than the normal installer since Opera actually had an "Upgrade" option! Seeing that was like being given free money; it was the /best thing ever/.

hesido # 21. March 2006, 20:43

I install Opera wherever I go, downloading it even with the worst connections, compactness is one of the nice features of Opera. Also I like the fast install where very little steps are taken and very little reviewing is only required. I hope these will be kept in mind in the future. Also, it should be made sure installing should NEVER cause a reboot. Most public computers reset all changes to harddisk with every reboot for privacy and avoiding permenant malicious changes to the harddisk, a reboot would cause a no-install. I don't know for betas, but for full versions, please make sure we have options.

allahini_seven_defansa_gelsin # 21. March 2006, 21:28

thanks a lot.

burnout426 # 21. March 2006, 21:31

For the MSI installer, you should make sure bug-165275 didn't carry over from the old installer.

With the old installer, if you wanted to uninstall Opera, you needed to run unwise.exe and do a custom uninstall and choose not to select HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\ShimInclusionList\OPERA.EXE

Otherwise, the uninstaller would remove that key and the embedded windows media player would be the old style in all of your other operas.

The new installer should just leave that key alone when uninstalling because there might be other Operas installed that need it.

erste # 21. March 2006, 21:36

Thanks... but: message in the form is scrolling up when you typing something.

sorry my english, i'm russian user and do not know the english. =)

raducoc # 21. March 2006, 21:36

I totally agree with mgillespie, # 21. March 2006, 17:12:32.
Please keep NSIS. MSIs sucks.

yathosho # 21. March 2006, 21:41

some opera coders could contribute to nsis with a plugin capable of network deployment.. i mean it in a similiar way google contributes to gaim2 for instance. both sides win!

Sushubh # 21. March 2006, 22:48

add one more feature to the site specific settings:

disable cache for this domain.

rschultz2002 # 21. March 2006, 23:37

Thanks for this. For the people like "Val_Parthen" that support the MSI you need to know they picked the wrong one for us 98/ME/NT users. I have 5 programs on this PC that uses it but can not install this Opera on ME. If Opera cares so much about the Networks and ITS you/they should provide them MSI installer for them only. The normal and new user should be first.

Stahn # 22. March 2006, 00:00

I kneel before Opera devs =P

Thank you for this.

About networking, I thought that with some macros, one can install Opera in an entire network with just a double click. Well, you have to do the macros, but that something you do just once.

And still hope for automatic updates, sometime... ;_;

outrun # 22. March 2006, 01:01

I love the progress of this weekly, the usability advances are great. Id be using it all the time if hovers were working correctly.

fantastxue # 22. March 2006, 01:45

Excuse me, why do you need the 'network install'? Or, anybody could explain the 'network install' for me?
Thanks!

gaoyiwei # 22. March 2006, 03:12

I love classical installer, MSI did not work!. Now, I'm running this build, i'm sure it WILL be super. except I cannot find my native-Chinese as previous builds.

hasina # 22. March 2006, 05:01

@ fantast_xue. Network installs are required so that the dumb admins at my school can install Opera to a hundred computers all over my school through one click, which they refuse to do otherwise.

WillYum # 22. March 2006, 05:33

Greetings Operaites!

I had a positive experience with MSI, except that it replaced the wrong Opera icon on my desktop (didn't give me a choice as the old installer did) and I had to go clean that up.

I agree with the importance of network install functionality and that it trumps many other considerations (not all).

That said, the new installer SHOULD have at least the same functionality as the opera installer we know and love. (i.e. User Profiles, Icon choices, directory choice).

That is my humble suggestion.

slashbeast # 22. March 2006, 05:54

Argh... where is the static-qt rpm !?

vinczej # 22. March 2006, 07:18

Thanks for the quick reaction for the installer problem!

lakeview # 22. March 2006, 08:07

For the MSI installer, you should make sure bug-165275 didn't carry over from the old installer...

thanks, burnout426, that is what i was looking for some time. I lost the key after installing new build.

well, opera still crashes when right-clicking player(old bug).

Phantom_of_The_Opera # 22. March 2006, 08:50

"Phantom_of_The_Opera,
Chill out, this is a preview. Don't like it, don't use it.
Wait for the final and then pass judgement. Impetiant twat."
By YtseJam, # 21. March 2006, 20:35:52

Dear YtseJam,

I wasn't talking about the new build. I was talking 'bout the talking =) Some kind of metacommunication.
I'm not really fond of that MS-bashing and I'm not really affected by the mourning of people who are still using '98 on wooden comps or cannot pass a verification for genuine software

As a German I'm telling all of you people: If there is a really dangerous company, than it is "Google". The perfect user-profile You can destillate by the combinaton of a few Google-"services" is a NIGHTMARE!
(Isn't there anyone who has to complain about having problems installing on Windows 3.1 in less than 20 minutes?)

stewie # 22. March 2006, 09:58

bug?:
the Find in Page option doesnt work at all with this forum:
http://forums.eurosport.com/index.php?
It just says "No matches" even on a single letter.

Friedrich # 22. March 2006, 11:36

Opera: Will you take this chance to give us a "install on USB stick" option? Maybe not with 9.0, but with 9.1 or 9.2? Please, please, please!

And will this mean that there will be a "real" update process for Opera, not just "install it over itself", which feels kinda strange?

gdr # 22. March 2006, 12:05

Ooooooh, why the MSI version? I frequently install Opera at various places and wouldn't like to deal with slow MSI bloat. Also what I have noticed about newbies, they react strangely about MSI installers ('WTF is going on!?')

dockersfan # 22. March 2006, 12:25

Hmmm I've installed it [not using the MSI version] and found I have no Opera in my programs listing meaning I need to go to the directory itsself to start it up. It was there and working with the previous build.

I've removed the program and all references in the registry to start again. After a clean uninstall and reboot, reinstalled it and no go. Has anyone else has experienced this?

I've also reported to the bug team that this build for me crashes/doesn't close properly when i close it.

SOL-Invictus # 22. March 2006, 12:41

In the V9 of Opera the automatic proxy configuration seems to be broken! The authentification for the proxy appears again and again but with correct authentifiaction information...

Also i get a "Bad Request (Invalid Verb)" (loading pages with NTLM authentication, loading the page works) when i try to submit a aspx-form (login to a self-developed page...)

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