Testing an install on VMWare - vmware

I have created an InstallShield single-executable install which includes some merge modules for VS2005 dependencies which go in the WinSxS, such as VC80.CRT. I work remotely, and when our tester runs the install on an XP machine, it works fine. I've also verified that when run on an XP machine that's missing the VC80.CRT version I need, the install does successfully install it. But, when our tester runs the install on a VMWare image (XP), the merge module does not get installed.
I know nothing about VMWare. Can somebody provide a "well, duh!" type of answer on this? I'd love to just be able to tell them that we can't expect it to install the merge module on a VMWare image. Or, is there some way I can make the merge module install properly under VMWare?
Thanks!


VMWare (in all its versions) is little more than a cunning piece of software that allows one computer to appear as though it is one or more different computers. You take a PC, install VMWare on it and presto it can appear as though it is one or more XP machines and several different types of Linux all at the same time. Very handy for testing.
Inside a VMWare server the 'guest' computers, as they are known, are little more than an image file, ie. a single file that contains a snapshot of a PC hard disk. VMWare server boots this as though it were a real PC booting from its hard disk, and VMWare makes sure the guest PC has access to all the hardware the it needs, be this real or simulated.
If something doesn't work on a VMWare image, but it does work on a 'real' PC then it is most likely to be something wrong with the image rather than something wrong with VMware (unless what you're doing requires some strange low-level hardware access that VMWare can't provide). Simply running an installer should function the same under VMWare as on the real PC, especially if you are using VMWare ESX.
The simple test in your case is to take the 'real' PC, make an image of it, and run this image under VMWare. It will almost certainly function correctly.


Agree with Toby.
You can use VMware vCenter Converter to make a VMware image of your real PC. Then try whether the install works on this image.

Related

Can an IDE/Netbeans connect to a remote computer and compile/run/debug code on it?

I'm developing a program for a specific environment. That means it needs to run on the OS and compile using its compiler. I have a different environment at home (Windows 8) is there a way Netbeans can be used to connect to the target environment and use its compiler? It is enabled for remote login.
So basically right now I write code on my home computer, connect using Putty to the target computer, copy the source code over, compile it and run it. I'm trying to simplyfy this process so I only have to use Netbeans.
Why don't I just get same compiler and do everything locally? The target computer is running Linux and the program has a lot of system calls.
I know Aptana has a simillar feature, but Aptana is so crappy in general I don't want to use it.
Let me know if my question doesn't make sense and I'll try and reword it.

Yes, you can do remote development in NetBeans. It's described in its Help subsystem:

Inno Setup - Setup.exe works locally, but not as a download

I compiled my first program this with Inno setup for a python 2.7 script with connections to opencv and numpy. The setup.exe works perfectly on my computer locally. It installs, it runs, there are no detectable errors.
When i go to make the setup.exe available through github:
https://github.com/bw4sz/OpenCV_HummingbirdsMotion/tree/master/Installer/Output
I can download the setup.exe, but on the SAME computer, it won't install: Error reads, the Windows version of the software is not compatible with the version you are running, check with the system if you need a x86 (64) or 32 bit version.
This is confusing to me, since the program was designed on this machine, and i just need to distribute it. Do i fundamentally not understand what Inno Setup does, i.e that a user needs to do more than download the setup.exe. I can provide scripts if needed.
Can someone point me in the right direction.
Thanks,
Ben

It depends on github. In a quick way I found this link, hope it help.

How can I install Qt onto another computer but in different directories?

I used the online download of Qt to install it on my desktop but now I also want it on my laptop and I am unsure of how I can do that without having to re-download. My internet connection is crap and I don't even know if the Laptop will allow me to considering that it is one issued by my school and not all downloads work. Please help! I tried copying all the files over to the laptop but now all the settings are weird because the computer I am using doesnt have (or allow access) to the C drive.

I've looked at where does an installed version of Qt store the paths.
It seems that you need to change the following:
Qt5.2.1/5.2.1/[compiler]/mkspecs/modules/qt_lib_[module].pri
In each of those files, change the line that begins with QT.[module].rpath.

can i run backup exec 10.0 from a server, but have the tape drive connected to Windows 98?

I just started as IT manager of a company that used to used an older version of backup exec that ran on a nt server. The tape drive they used also only has drivers available for up to Win 98. So i installed win 98 in a virtual enviroment and got the tape drive running. But the new versions of Backup Exec only work on the new operating systems of course. So, my choice seems to be to either find a driver for the tape drive, (T300o HP) that works on the newer operating systems, or to find a way to install the latest Backup exec on a server and see if i can access the tape drive which is currently on the 98 nmachine. I hope this makes since. I have no problem purchasing the new backup Exec. Time is a huge issue as i am trying to recover lost engineering drawings that were backed up years ago with backup exec.. that they are needing now. Sorry for the long story, but i am out of ideas. Thank you!!!!

This link implies that they have NT 3.51/4.0 drivers for the T3000 also. I'd try and find an old copy of Backup Exec that runs on the hardware running the old software. Failing that, I guess you could try and read the tape block by block using an old Linux distro (circa 1999 or so). Then you'd have to find some way of making sense of the backup, since it's not in QIC format.

How to develop a DirectFB app without leaving X.11 environment

I'm trying to develop a GUI application for an embedded platform, without any windowing whatsoever and I'm doing that with DirectFB, and it suits my needs very fine.
Since the embedded I develop for is not that powerful, I would really like to try to develop on my own Ubuntu desktop. The problem is Framebuffer is conflicting with X.org causing me to leave the whole desktop, and shutdown X.org just to see the result of my changes.
Is there a good framebuffer simulator that suits my needs? Qt has one, called QVFb, but it only works for developing Qt apps, and the VNC back-end of DirectFB always crash.
So, any ideas?

DirectFB has a X11 backend.
$ sudo apt-get install libdirectfb-extra # for Debian and Ubuntu, anyhow
$ cat ~/.directfbrc
system=x11
force-windowed
Also, DirectFB has a SDL backend, and SDL has a X11 backend. Also, SDL has a GGI backend, and GGI has an X backend. That's a bit circuitous, but it should work :)
I tested it with
$ SDL_VIDEODRIVER=directfb ffplay some_movie.avi
and got a nice 640x480 window with media playing and DirectFB handling layering and input, so I'm sure this works.

The three previous answers are all good suggestions. I'd suggest trying ephemient's answer because it's the simplest. For more details on setting up your .directfbrc file, check out "man directfbrc".
One other possibility would be to switch from X to another virtual terminal (using CTRL+ALT+F1), run your directfb program, and then switch back X (using CTRL+ALT+F7).

I came to use ephemient's solution to run DirectFB applications inside a chroot environment (target filesystem as a courtesy of buildroot) in addition to Xnest, a separate X environment which runs in a window of the current X.
$ Xnest -ac :1 &
$ cd $TARGET_DIR # into the target file system root
$ DISPLAY=:1 sudo chroot . usr/bin/df_neo
This way you can assure not only your directfb installation is correct, but also all the required dependencies are installed inside the chroot'ed file system.

You could use Moblin Image Creator to create a disk image of Moblin, which you can then run inside a VM like QEMU. You can then test your DirectFB application inside the virtual machine.

You could develop (i.e. edit and compile) your application on your Ubuntu desktop, and test your application on the embedded platform that it is intended to run on.
If the embedded platform supports networking, you might be able to reduce the length of your edit-compile-test loop by running the application directly from an NFS share.

Here is a nice example with qemu and directFB:
https://bootlin.com/blog/qemu-arm-directfb-demo/