Re: Emacs Installer for MS Windows

[Dhruva Krishnamurthy]

On Mon, 23 Aug 2004 21:21:04 +0200, "Lennart Borgman"
<address@hidden> said:
> Now I would like some suggestions. I hope you do not mind. First about
> where
> to install Emacs. On ms windows most programs are installed in
> "c:\program
> files\" as I guess you know. I see some alternatives (which I illustrate
> with where emacs.exe is found):
> 
> A) "c:\program files\emacs\bin\emacs.exe
> B) "c:\program files\emacs-21.3\bin\emacs.exe
> C) "c:\program files\emacs\emacs\bin\emacs.exe
> D) "c:\program files\emacs\emacs-21.3\bin\emacs.exe
> 
> Which one would you prefer? What about using "c:\program files"?

Folder names with spaces are always a nightmare in scripts. Can we avoid
this and try to install
directly under "C:/GNU/emacs" or "C:/GNU/emacs-21.3 ".
IMO, many users using GNU Emacs use lot of other GNU software, having a
top level GNU folder might help proper grouping of related tools.

> I include gnuclient and wonder where to put these exe-files. Currently I
> use
> a structure like C) and put them in "c:\program files\emacs\w32bin". I
> also
> put a copy of 7za.exe from 7-zip here to be able to unpack tar.gz files.
> (With permission from the author of course.)

How about "C:/GNU/bin" as _some_ of the tools or execs are not just
specific to GNU Emacs.

I use the following folder setup and have some of the following
advantages.
Under D:/GNU, I have:
D:/GNU/bin 
D:/GNU/info
D:/GNU/emacs-beta
D:/GNU/emacs-rel
D:/GNU/site-lisp

1. GNUclient, GNUserv and other image libraries are in D:/GNU/bin. I
have added this folder into PATH env. Since these files do not get
modified too often, I need not worry during upgrading GNU Emacs.
2. I can selectively add "D:/GNU/emacs-beta/bin" or
"D:/GNU/emacs-rel/bin" in the PATH env. Based on this, the GNUclient
will launch "emacs.exe" for the desired version. With this, I can have
multiple versions of GNU Emacs. May not be useful for a plain user
though.
3. All user specific elisp code goes into D:/GNU/site-lisp, this is
again version independent.
4. With this setup, an upgrade just means, removing the version specific
GNU Emacs folder (and remove it from PATH) and copy a new version folder
(and add it to PATH).
Note:
 Adding to PATH could be done like:
 GNUEMACSPATH=D:/GNU/bin;D:/GNU/emacs-21.3/bin
 PATH=%GNUEMACSPATH%;%PATH%
 For an upgrade, you just need to modify the contents of "GNUEMACSPATH"
 env. I know it can be difficult to or unwise to modify the PATH env
 directly.

with best regards,
dhruva
________________________________________
Dhruva Krishnamurthy
Proud FSF member: #1935
http://schemer.fateback.com/