Installation (computer programs)
From Free net encyclopedia
Installation (or setup) of a program is the act and the effect of putting that program in a computer system so that it can be executed. It may include configuration, or part thereof. Many programs, including operating systems, come with a general-purpose or dedicated installer which automates most of the work required for their installation. Others can be installed simply by copying their files to the desired location; this is common for Mac OS X applications and was the case, among others, of early Firefox versions (Firebird) for Windows.
Also operating systems exist that don't need any installation and can be run directly from a bootable CD, DVD, or USB drive, without affecting other operating systems installed on the machine. An example is Knoppix Linux.
The term then naturally extends to plugins, device drivers and software files which are not by themselves programs.
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Common operations performed during software installations include creation or modification of:
- Shared and non-shared program files
- Folders/directories
- Windows registry entries (Windows only)
- Configuration file entries
- Environment variables
- Links or shortcuts
Some jargon expressions
- Manual installation
- Installation performed without an installer or with a significant amount of manual user operations in addition to installer-assisted part(s).
- Silent installation
- Installation that does not display messages or windows during its progress. "Silent installation" is not a synonym of "unattended installation", though it is often improperly used as such.
- Unattended installation
- Installation that is performed without user interaction during its progress or, in a stricter sense, with no user present at all, except eventually for the initial launch of the process. An installation process usually requires a user who "attends" it to make choices at request: accepting an EULA, specifying preferences and passwords, etc. In graphical environments, installers that offer a wizard-based interface are common. However these installers may also provide command line switches that allow performing unattended installations.
- Headless installation
- Installation performed without using a monitor connected to the destination computer (in particular, on a computer with no video output at all). This can be an (attended) installation performed from another machine connected via LAN or via a serial cable.
- Unattended and headless installations are common tasks for system administrators.
- Clean installation
- Given the complexity of a typical installation there are many factors that may interfere with its successful completion. In particular files that are leftover of old installations of the same program or an unstable situation of the operating system may all prevent a given program to install and work correctly. An installation performed in absence of such interfering factors (which may vary from program to program) is called a clean installation. In particular a clean Windows installation can be performed by formatting its destination partition before the actual installation process.
- Flat installation
- An installation of a program performed from a copy (called a flat copy) of its original media contents (mostly CDs or DVDs) to a hard drive, rather than directly from the media. This may help in some situations where the target machine isn't able to cope with random access reads from CD/DVD at the same time as performing the CPU-intensive tasks often required by an installation.