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Can we talk about the rude installers not asking for installation locations?
Title.
I think it is very rude to just install to any "default" directory and not asks the user where he wants it to be installed.
- ttoinou 11mo agoMore options, more mess. The user will always do something funky, then don't remember about it and then complain to the software publisher that it's not working correctly
- powerhouse007 11mo agoIf software allows changing install location, it should work from everywhere. And there's no excuse for hardcoding Program Files anymore with multiple package managers on windows. I feel your pain as a developer but as a user, sometimes I need the choice. Try to hide it so non-techies people can click Next Next Next but put it in advanced options somewhere.
- ttoinou 11mo agoIf software allows changing install location, it should work from everywhere So, we're saying the same thing, what you said is the Contraposition of what I am saying, they are equivalent
- politelemon 11mo agoNot really, the common pattern is to use a well known default and then allow advanced users to modify their install location. Installation location has been a choice for well over 30 years now and a lot of the initial problems ironed out.
- bigbuppo 11mo agoYou do realize that most laptops ship with almost zero storage available on the C: drive, right? You have actually looked at the specs of real hardware in use in the real world, right?
- ttoinou 11mo agoWe don't know what kind of software the OP is talking about though. For me for my software there's specific folders to use, it's not Program Files windows classic subfolder
- breezk0 11mo agoSorry, but I cannot agree. >> don't remember about it If you take your time to manually set any kind of new installation location, I assume you know what you are doing and will obviously remember. >> complain to the software publisher Changing the installation location should not break the program and if it does, its obviously a bug, or what are you trying to tell me?
- ttoinou 11mo agoYou might not remember, and it might be in multiple years, and it might be someone else handling this
- ranger_danger 11mo agoFirejail on Linux and Sandboxie on Windows means I can let programs install whenever they want, and I always know it'll be inside some other top-level directory I specify. Probably better to not let programs spray all over your filesystem anyway.
- bigbuppo 11mo agoAh yes, because people should be forced to use some random third-party program because developers went out of their way to write their own installer that lacks a feature every standard installer has had since the 1980s.
- zahlman 11mo agoMaking the project work when it's in an arbitrary place isn't always trivial. The proposed "random third-party program" is effectively an extension to the OS.
- 1xtrm0 11mo ago[dead]
- ape4 11mo agoAs long as the uninstaller can find it
- bigbuppo 11mo agoWell the problem with that is that the past few generations of laptops have taken a page from chromebooks and only give you 128GB of storage, maybe 256GB if you're lucky, unless you add more, assuming that's even possible. Storage has never been cheaper, yet most laptops ship with barely enough storage for a base Windows install.
- HeyLaughingBoy 11mo agoSame here. I don't care where the application goes; I care where the data goes. One of my initial annoyances when I started using PlatformIO was that it assumes a default workspace directory and as a new user, it took me forever to figure out where it was putting my files. I have a standard directory structure that I use and this was really messing me up.
- andai 11mo ago>I care where the data goes I used a Win10 debloater last year about 2 weeks after install. It deleted Minecraft, which is apparently a UWP too, and it deleted my world, because UWPs apparently store userdata in program directory.
- krferriter 11mo agoAlmost like you might need some system-wide registry of application configuration...
- zahlman 11mo agoI don't want an uninstaller to be required by default.
- IAmBroom 11mo agoI think that ship has sailed. As soon as software uses more than one custom path to store its crap, I can no longer be sure I've deleted everything.
- StableAlkyne 11mo agoThe most annoying instance of this is installers in Windows that just assume you want to go into `C:/Program Files`, which nowadays requires admin to be modified This is very annoying on company machines where you may not have admin, since now there's red tape with your IT because the installer was poorly written. Half the reason I use the WSL is because you at least get "root" on it, so permissions are never an issue Edit: there may be something lost in translation. This post is in reference to software your IT already approves, which happens to only install to program files.
- loloquwowndueo 11mo agoThere’s an argument to be made that this is by design/edict. The company does NOT want you installing random crap on their machines.
- kemotep 11mo agoIn a Windows environment this can be managed with AppLocker, or an endpoint management solution, or 3rd-Party tool like Threatlocker. It becomes less about controlling the users and more about stopping any bad guy dead in their tracks. If nothing but what has been implicitly authorized can execute, then 99% of ransomware attacks will be stopped immediately even after the user clicks the link. Your company software procurement process shouldn’t be so onerous that people turn to Shadow IT. You have to work with people where they are.
- StableAlkyne 11mo agoNo, that's the default behavior in Windows. If you install to, say, app data it's fine. If you install to program files, you need admin because it is a protected folder. > The company does NOT want you installing random crap on their machines. Why do you immediately jump to the conclusion that the post is about installing "random crap?"
- deleted 11mo ago[deleted]
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- gjvc 11mo ago/opt/vendor/product/version/
- crazygringo 11mo agoCan you be more specific about which platform you're talking about? On a Mac, I've never wanted an application to go anywhere but the default /Applications. I don't ever recall being asked if I want another location, nor would I want to be. Is it different on Windows or Linux? And why would you want a different install location?
- birdman3131 11mo agoThe main reason is wanting it on a second drive.
- afandian 11mo agoAnd the stuff in "~/Library/Application Support/" and/or "/Library/Application Support" . It's a well-defined place.
- marcosdumay 11mo agoThe OP is probably talking about Windows.
- al_borland 11mo agoNot the OP, but I do sometimes install macOS applications to ~/Applications. This is especially useful at work where /Application requires elevated permissions. I used to have to request admin rights for a period of time every time VS Code needed do something. In ~/Applications, that’s not an issue. Of course, 90% of macOS apps (outside of the App Store) don’t have installers. You just drag the app where you want it, so it’s a moot point.
- politelemon 11mo agoOn any platforms that allows choice of installation location. There could be a multitude of reasons from control to organisation to disk usage.
- timemct 11mo agoYou've probably been asked about it, but it's often phrased differently than simply asking where to install the app. "Would you like to install theAppInQuestion for all users of this computer (install in /Applications) or just you(install in ~/Applications)?"
- ohyoutravel 11mo agoOr she.
- alejoar 11mo agoThey is the way
- ranger_danger 11mo agoI've literally had someone get upset that I used "they", you can't win with some people.
- RamRodification 11mo agoYou can probably win with that person though. Just not by using "they".
- munchlax 11mo agoPerhaps because they is plural. Plural is reserved for the royal family in some cultures.
- deleted 11mo ago
- diffeomorphism 11mo agoWeird windows centric view. There shouldn't even be a question where to put things much less a "wherever you want". Instead you want a sane, sensible standard.
- munchlax 11mo agoThere exists makefiles that don't allow DESTDIR, as in mkdir derp gmake install DESTDIR=$PWD/derp Distribution maintainers have to patch this :(
- zahlman 11mo agoI'm accustomed to setting this up with `./configure --prefix`.
- zahlman 11mo agoI would say that "expect the computer to decide for me", rather than having control over where the files are, is the Windows-centric view.
- JohnFen 11mo agoI would love a sane, sensible standard. But I also want to be able to decide to not adhere to that standard when it gets in the way. It's my machine, there's no reason why I can't make these decisions myself.
- gruez 11mo agoYou mean how on linux "make install" just installs to whatever directory (/usr/bin/, /usr/local/bin/, /opt/?), and if you want to change it you have to do ./configure --prefix=whatever?
- wongarsu 11mo agoConfiguration should go in a defined place. /etc and ~/.config on linux, registry and %appdata% on Windows. A common location makes management, synchronization and backups easier, and space is rarely a concern for configs. Cache directories should go in a defined place. /var/ and ~/.cache on linux, %localappdata% on Windows. But application files have a huge size range depending on the assets the program needs (typical sizes range from the tens of MB to the tens of GB, with large outliers in either direction). I have multiple tiers of storage (a terabyte of SSD, multiple TB of HDD, tens of TB of network storage) and allocate my software to the desired storage tier depending on my needs And this isn't just a thing on Windows, Android does the same by allowing you to moving apps to the SD card, provided you have one. Management is just greatly simplified in that case because you have at most two meaningful storage locations on an Android location, while desktop or laptop might have any number of them
- alphazard 11mo agoI agree with the sentiment; I also want to control where things are installed. But the framing of the technical problem here is totally backwards. The operating system or application manager within the operating system (what does flatpak consider itself?) should decide where all application state goes. The application shouldn't ever prompt the user for this, it should just assume a path inside a sandbox. That path inside the sandbox will get mapped to where-ever outside the sandbox, and that's where the user exercises control. We already see this pattern emerging with docker images. Everything assumes `/data` is a good place to store things, and `/config` is a good place to read configuration from. I want every application to do this. If I want it to store state, then I'll decide to map those to directories that are persisted.
- whalesalad 11mo ago100% agree with this.
- alphazard 11mo agoBut what about for state that the application doesn't really "own"? e.g. I want to open a PDF in an editor. The PDF is in my documents folder, and I don't want to expose all of my documents to the application in its sandbox. Fine grained access to single files should be given out using a file picker. The application manager passes in a socket to the application sandbox. The application connects to that socket using a known hard-coded path. It sends a message (client->server) over the socket, the listening file picking process opens a new GUI window to prompt the user to select a file. The user picks a file and a file descriptor is sent over the socket to the application (server -> client).
- IAmBroom 11mo agoSpoken like a Linux software developer, I suppose. As a Windows user of generic software (image editing, video players, games, etc.), I want to be able to control such crap. I have a media player that can easily fill a small HD with its mindlessly huge DB, for instance. Rather than manually cleaning periodically, or upgrading my $y$tem, it's easiest to say "Software, store your data here".
- bee_rider 11mo agoIt really depends on the system. In Linux for example it is pretty conventional to ask. But, the asking is often done by querying some environment variables. If a program prompts the user for a directory instead of querying the appropriate environment variable, that is a violation of the stated user preference.
- IAmBroom 11mo agoHuh? How is "the appropriate environment variable" the "stated user preference"?
- BoredPositron 11mo agoI am really more annoyed about config files that are cluttering up everything. Even resolve and other big packages started to clutter the Documents folder on Linux.
- gethly 11mo agoAlways chose custom settings when installing anything. Not only you always get to pick target location but often you can avoid installing some additional garbage. I see no problem here though. Maybe i am too used to these things and some people just never learn and click on every button that is presented to them?
- blauditore 11mo agoAfter many years of working with computers, I'm still confused about what exactly installing means. Whenever I have to set up something by hand (e.g. some SDK), there's a good chance of spending hours trying to make everything work everywhere, mostly dealing with environment variables, where to set them, and how to make sure all the tool who need to use the thing see it. Not to speak about the slight differences between operating systems. Maybe I just suck at this.