I hate installers

http://unhandledexpression.com/2010/05/17/i-hate-installers/

by geal • 16 years ago

6 10 16 years ago

makecheck• 16 years ago

Nice breakdown, but if you ask me, even the article's suggested reduction to "only" 5 screens is ridiculous. There are many things I've always hated about Windows, and this kind of brain-deadness is near the top of the list.

The iPhone App Store model is pretty much perfect: one step, "install the thing" (or two, to authenticate, if you haven't recently). Any progress is asynchronous, and it is completely obvious when the installation is finished. All of the app's files are in one place, which eliminates 99% of the reason an installer/uninstaller seems necessary in the first place.

Granted, the iPhone auto-selects an install location for security reasons, but there's no reason a desktop OS couldn't choose someplace "obvious and reasonable" to save a step for the user. Of course, this also requires that apps be easily relocated after the fact, which is another stupid flaw in many OSes...

X-Istence2• 16 years ago

Mac OS X did it right: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1356203

Alleyfield• 16 years ago

How are you going to improve the user experience by cramming 6 different questions (which make no sense at all to a newbie) in to a one window?

That has an oxymoron feel into it, don't you think?

drivebyacct• 16 years ago

Which is why you hide them behind a screen that lists "Install with Defaults". USA English, Program Files, Simple Install settings. I agree with the author that 95% of people install software this way.

It doesn't really matter. It doesn't get better than DMGs. Oh, unless you use a FOSS system.

jodrellblank• 16 years ago

I hate installers too, which is why whenever possible I'll pick a no-install program.

Forget all the installer stuff, download an exe and run it and there's the program. At the most, download a group of files, extract them into a folder and run, and there's the program.

Definitely keep the advanced and simple choice when "simple" means "we install the toolbars you would never choose if we asked".

Also dump the freaking download managers (Adobe, Microsoft) and FEAD Systems Optimiser (Adobe) and the download-a-program-which-downloads-the-installer (Microsoft .Net framework).

geal2• 16 years ago

Well, in the article, I especially told to forget about making money with toolbars. But I'm not confident one can easily teach this kind of good manners to developers...

jsiarto• 16 years ago

Mac OS X has the best "community norm" for installing software: 1. Download compressed .dmg from Awesome Software Inc. 2. OS X unpacks it automatically and mounts the drive on your desktop (with a new Finder window open) 3. Drag your app to the Applications folders 4. No step 4.

X-Istence2• 16 years ago

4. Launch application

geal2• 16 years ago

I agree, Mac OS did it right. But I'm not a fan of packaging two different architectures in one installer. It makes the package bloated (which is also a problem with Windows installers).

stck• 16 years ago

Installing things is the single greatest improvement when switching to a modern Linux distribution. Click, click, done.

I hate installers

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