... for an update that is...

Hi all, it's been rather a long time between updates but rest assured the team has been working hard. We've had quite a few ups and downs over the past few months but things are back on track and to prove it here are a few screenshots of the Exogenesis installer. It's getting closer to being finished. I'll post technical details in another post later this week and copy this to the blog.

The flow is similar to all you are used except for a few variations.

If users are found on your target system and you are formatting the partition you can still save the data and re-import into the new system.

Only 1 partition screen is seen if you follow the standard install path.

Images taken require webcam to be connected. These images become your logon images.

The confirmation screen detects if you are connected to a network, if so you can choose an option to download updates during the install.

Those graphics look really good! Good job, MonkeyAbout!

More details here:

http://blog.auroraos.org/general/aurora ... installer/

Looking good!

How does this work? Does the program run and poke around the hardware and then ask the user for information and then write out a script to be executed to do the actual installation? If so, this would allow for some easy early testing on a wide range of kit, by terminating the process once all the info has been gathered and then examining the script which has been produced. Alternatively, if the program actually goes on to do the installation itself, does it produce a configuration file, which might be examined, as above?

Geoff

A default run through ( no scripts on exits ) will install the default system:

Gdu (gnome-disk-utility) is referenced to create/delete/modify partitions. This is done directly as gdu interfaces to udisks, no HAL.

Keyboard settings are pulled and set using the gconf api directly.

Detection of existing systems uses os-prober, gdu and written code to pull out fstab details from the existing installation and any user details that exist.

Targets are mounted using gdu, the live image is basically copied across and configured using gconfs and the code generates fstab.

The code calls the approriate grub commands to install grub on the selected target.

If there are any scripts in the exit folders ( e.g. user create exit, then they are run ), if any scripts are found in the gconf exit then they are also run. Run order is determined by filename, 1.sh... 2.sh etc.

I've kept as much configuration and copying in the code as I thought possible before calling external process such as the grub configs.

There are no configs or scripts produced, it's all in code. Though I may add the option to generate a log of everything it would do prior to running an actual install.

Steve.

Great work Steve!

Just a thought Steve, could this system of migrating users settings work as a noob repair option on an existing aurora install, similar to the Windows repair install option? If so, it would be sweet for version 2 of the installer to actually have some sort of repair button option on the 'Start of the install process' page. Anyway just a thought rather than a feature request, as you probably have enough on your plate at the moment

You're probably right with the V2 Good idea though, that could also be extended to read the dpkg status files and reinstall all the existing apps... definitely not in this version though

Nice work with the graphics, they do look rather good when it's running, I just need to tidy up the text and buttons to do them justice.

Actually, there is something I didn't think of before, as Exogenesis copies the current instance to another disk it will copy ANY system it is running on to the target disk. Soooo, if I run exo on the laptop and connected a disk of the same size, partition it the same then everything is copied over and the target disk is made bootable. I'll need to run some further checks first to confirm it but the theory is sound... back to the beer... er... code

Nice! Sounds like Exogenesis could end up being far more than just a simple installer. Graphics wise if you want anything moved about, just let me know. Also I should have some more bits and some updated versions for next weekend.

Ah, it detects users on the target disk not the disk the installer is running from. Could be changed with a bit of work and a command line switch but I think I'll shelve it for V2, add it is a roadmap feature for system recovery

Brilliant work guys! Its great to see some appauling scribbles I drew last year turn into a fully featured and brilliant looking app! Great work Steve and MonkeyAbout!!

haha nice comic

On my HP mini-note, I have chopped the disc up into several partitions to allow the installation of various OSs and versions. I have /home as one of the partitions and when I do a new intallation, I tell it to use the /home partition, but to NOT reformat it. This seems to work well for me, although I am not sure that I get to see the exact appearance that the designer had put together. How does this compare with the new functionality which you describe?

Geoff