[ python-Feature Requests-1635335 ] Add registry functions to windows postinstall

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Feature Requests item #1635335, was opened at 2007-01-14 21:00
Message generated for change (Comment added) made by loewis
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Category: Distutils
Group: None
>Status: Closed
>Resolution: Wont Fix
Priority: 5
Private: No
Submitted By: anatoly techtonik (techtonik)
Assigned to: Thomas Heller (theller)
Summary: Add registry functions to windows postinstall

Initial Comment:
It would be useful to add regkey_created() or regkey_modified() to windows postinstall scripts along with directory_created() and file_created(). Useful for adding installed package to App Paths.

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>Comment By: Martin v. Löwis (loewis)
Date: 2007-01-24 22:48

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Closing this as "won't fix", then. techtonik, if you think this is an
important feature, please contribute a patch.

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Comment By: Thomas Heller (theller)
Date: 2007-01-24 21:47

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General comments: There are some problems with bdist_wininst that I assume
will get worse in the future, especially with the postinstall script,
because of different versions of the MS C runtime library.  The installers
that bdist_wininst creates are linked against a certain version which must
be the same version that the Python runtime uses.  If they do not match,
the output of the postinstall script will not be displayed in the gui, or,
in the worst case it could crash.
The second problem is that bdist_wininst will not work with 64-bit
Pythons.

All this *could* probably be fixed, of course, but since bdist_msi does
*not* have these problems IMO bdist_msi will superseed bdist_wininst sooner
or later.

About the concrete problem:  Originally, when bdist_wininst was first
implemented, Python did not have the _winreg module, so it was not possible
to create or remove registry entries in the install script or postinstall
script anyway and these function would not have made any sense at all. 
They could probably make sense now, but it is equally possible to modify
the registry in the postinstall-script at installation time, and revert
these changes in the postinstall-script at uninstallation time.

I would prefer not to make these changes, since a workaround is possible.

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Comment By: Martin v. Löwis (loewis)
Date: 2007-01-20 19:07

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Thomas, what do you think?



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Comment By: anatoly techtonik (techtonik)
Date: 2007-01-20 15:26

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Windows postinstall script is bundled with installation, launched after
installation and just before uninstall. It is described here.
http://docs.python.org/dist/postinstallation-script.html#SECTION005310000000000000000

Where these should be defined? I do not know - there are already some
functions that are said to be "available as additional built-in functions
in the installation script." on the page above. 

The purpose is to be able to create/delete registry keys during
installation. This should also be reflected in installation log file with
appropriate status code so that users could be aware of what's going on.

I think the functions needed are already defined in
http://docs.python.org/lib/module--winreg.html but the module is very
low-level. I'd rather use Autoit like API - 
http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/docs/functions/RegRead.htm
http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/docs/functions/RegWrite.htm
http://www.autoitscript.com/autoit3/docs/functions/RegDelete.htm


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Comment By: Martin v. Löwis (loewis)
Date: 2007-01-20 11:55

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Can you please elaborate? Where should these functions be defined, what
should they do, and when should they be invoked (by what code)? Also, what
is a "windows postinstall script"?

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