[Zope-dev] Windows Installer for Zope 2.9+

[Tim Peters]

[Sidnei da Silva]
> Just noticed a checkin talking about the Windows Installer builder. I
> hope to find some time soon to take a look at that, since we now
> require Python 2.4 and Python 2.4 uses the 'Microsoft Installer'. I
> recall talking with Mark about it and he said it would take some time
> to fix the build process.

I just asked Andreas (off-list) what his Windows plans were for 2.9 --
for various reasons I assumed someone else was already looking at
this, but that assumption may be wrong (and given the lack of relevant
checkins recently, almost certainly wrong <frown>).

WRT Python 2.4, I never found a sane way to just _extract_ files from
an .msi installer, so that part of the build process is dead meat now.
 In other "bundle everything" Windows installers at Zope Corp (such as
for ZRS), I copy Python .pyd. .dll and .exe files from my own Python
2.4.2 installation instead.  These binary files are all the
build-Zope-installer process really needs from the Python Windows
installer; the rest (like .py and .h files) can be taken from a Python
tarball.  You can avoid wrestling with .msi entirely this way.

Possible headache:  Python 2.4.2 requires msvcr71.dll, which is a
Microsoft DLL (it's akin to msvcrt.dll for Visual Studio 6 -- it's the
C runtime for VC 7.1), and one for which the redistribution conditions
are unclear (at least to me).  You can't assume that all Windows boxes
already have this DLL.

Another:  I have no idea how the new zpkg-based build process will
work with a Zope2-style installer.  A Zope3-style installer is
different in many ways (it's a "plain" distutils-based installer, and
requires that the end user get and install Python & pywin32 first). 
Plan on pain-time here.