SDD Support for Installers monolithic artifacts

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SDD Support for Installersmonolithic artifacts

• Quenio dos Santos
• Macrovision
• September 6, 2007

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Problem

• Installers are normally single files that contain
  selectable content, i.e., a monolithic
  artifact
• Artifacts on SDD do not contain selectable
  content. Selection is performed by picking whole
  artifacts never picking portions of artifacts.
• How to allow selectable content bundled in
  installers become selectable (and/or referenced)
  by SDD consumers?

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Original Proposal Shared Artifacts

• Add a shared boolean attribute (defaults to
  false) to ArtifactType.ltsdd-ddInstallArtifact
  type"executable fileRef"win_bundle"
  shared"true"gt
• Enable NameAndOptionalValuePairType to specify
  that the value will be appended to a parameter of
  the same name.
• New boolean attribute called append optional,
  false
• New string attribute called delimiter
  optionalltsdd-ddArgument name"FEATURE_LIST"
  value"THIS_IU_FEATURE" append"true"
  delimiter"" /gt

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Practical Issues withShared Artifacts

• Installer arguments are NOT name/value
  pairsE.g. install i silent DFEATURE_LISTAppli
  cation,Help
• Selectable content has 1-to-many associations to
  IU/artifactsE.g. Application (WAR, Database)
  Help (Users Guide, Javadocs)
• Installers are normally platform-specificE.g.
  install.exe install.bin install.app

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Key Questions for Monolithic Artifacts

• How to describe selectable content in monolithic
  artifacts?
• How to activate the install/uninstall of its
  selected content?
• Should the atomic artifacts found in a monolithic
  artifact be exposed to SDD?
• How much metadata of the monolithic artifact has
  to be exposed?

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Alternative Approaches

• Full SDD Description
• Partial SDD Description
• Alternate Shared Artifact Approach

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Full SDD Description

• Allow referencing of atomic artifacts bundled in
  monolithic artifactltsdd-ddInstallArtifact
  typewar fileRefmy_wargtltfile idmy_war
  urlfile///install.jar/jar///path/my.war/gt
  
• Leverage SDD to fully describe installer
• selectable content map to features
• installable units map to components
• artifacts map to actions/resources

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Partial SDD Description

• ALSO references atomic artifacts bundled in
  monolithic artifact
• ONLY describes hosted artifacts
• One IU for single OS host
• One or more IUs for non-OS hosts (application
  servers database server)

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Alternate Shared Artifact

• Still introduce the shared artifacts concept
• Provide mechanism to execute self-installable
  artifacts
• Allow selectable content to directly reference
  artifacts
• ltselectableContentgt
• ltfeaturesgt
• ltfeature idApplicationgt
• ltartifactRef idinstallergt
• ltvariable namefeatureApp valueApplication
  /gt
• lt/artifactRefgt
• lt/featuregt
• ltfeature idHelpgt
• ltartifactRef idinstallergt
• ltvariable namefeatureHelp valueHelp/gt
• lt/artifactRefgt
• lt/featuregt
• lt/featuresgt
• lt/selectableContentgt
• ltsharedArtifactsgt
• ltartifact idinstaller type"executable
  fileRefinstaller" shared"true"gt

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Comparing Aproaches

• Full description provides most flexibility
• Partial description provides more control
• Share artifact approach requires changes to SDD
  model
• Shared artifacts may be the only way in which we
  can rely on the installers runtime.