The Packs Element
Packs in IzPack are bundles of files grouped under a certain package ID. Each file or set of files in a pack can be given certain attributes, which tell the compiler
- from where to get files into the compiled setup
and the installer - where to put the files
- which files to directly execute (or just receive the executable permission)
- which files to parse and replace variables in
- whether to overwrite existing target files with the same path
- whether to rename existing target files with the same path before they are overwritten
Each pack can be selected or deselected by default or by the user except is marked hidden or mandatory.
Using packs
There are the following possible root elements to define packs:
- pack
- refpack
- refpackset
which might embed a couple of possible nested elements describing the pack.
<pack>
Attributes
Attribute |
Usage |
---|---|
|
defines the pack name |
|
takes |
|
optional. Lets you make the pack targeted to a specific operating system, for instance unix, mac and so on |
|
optional. Lets you choose whether the pack is selected for installation by default or not. Possible values are yes and no. A pack which is not preselected needs to be explicitly selected by the user during installation to get installed |
|
can be used so that the files are not located in the installer Jar. The possible values are true or false, the default being false. The author of this feature needed to put his application on a CD so that the users could run it directly from this media. However, he also wanted to offer them the possibility to install the software localy. Enabling this feature will make IzPack take the files on disk instead of from the installer. Please make sure that your relative files paths are correct! |
|
this attribute is used to give a unique id to the pack to be used for internationalization via packsLang.xml file |
|
this attribute is used to reference a unique resource that represents the pack's image for the ImgPacksPanel. The resource should be defined in the <resources> element of the installation XML using the same value for the id attribute of the |
|
an id of a condition which has to be fullfilled to install this package |
|
takes true or false and specifies whether the pack shall be shown in the packs panel. The size of a hidden pack will be used to calculate the required space, but the pack itself won't be shown. A hidden pack can be preselected or selected conditionally. For the latter, you have to specify a |
Nested Elements
<description>
- pack description
The contents of the <description>
tag describe the pack contents. This description is displayed if the user highlights the pack during installation.
<depends>
- pack dependencies
This can be used to make this pack selectable only to be installed only if some other is selected to be installed. The pack can depend on more than one by specifying more than one <depends>
elements. Circular depedencies are not supported and the compiler reports an error if one occurs.
This tag takes the following attribute:
|
The name of the pack that this one depends on |
<os>
- OS restrictions
It is possible to restrict a pack to a certain list of operating systems. This tag takes the following attributes:
|
unix, windows or mac |
|
the exact OS name (ie Windows, Linux, ...) |
|
the exact OS version (see the JVM os.version property) |
|
the machine architecture (see the JVM os.arch property) |
<updatecheck>
This feature can update an already installed package, therefore removing superfluous files after installation. Here's how this feature's author (Tino Schwarze) described it on the IzPack development mailing-list:
Each pack can now specify an <updatecheck>
tag. It supports a subset of ant fileset syntax, e.g.:
<updatecheck> <include name="lib/**" /> <exclude name="config/local/** /> </updatecheck>
If the paths are relative, they will be matched relative to $INSTALL_PATH
. Update checks are only enabled if at least one <include>
is specified. See {{com.izforge.izpack.installer.Unpacker
for details.
<file>
- add files and/or directories
The <file>
tag specifies a single file (a directory is a file, too!) to include into the pack.
Attributes
Attribute |
Description |
Required |
Values |
---|---|---|---|
|
the file location (relative path) - if this is a directory its content will be added recursively. It may contain previously defined static variables (see |
yes |
|
|
the destination directory, could be something like |
yes |
|
|
Limit installation of this particular file only to the given target OS type. |
no |
"unix" | "windows" | "mac" |
|
Whether to overwrite existing files. |
no |
"true" | "false" | "asktrue" | "askfalse" | "update" |
overrideRenameTo |
Globmapper to rename a conflicting file to. This works similar like the <globmapper> in File Name Mappers, whereby the mapper's from attribute is set to "" and the to attribute exactly to the value given here. Example ".bak" will rename the target file by appending the suffix .bak before overwriting it. The override attribute must be set "true" to activate this feature. |
no |
String - valid globmapper target expression |
blockable |
For Windows only, ignored on non-Windows systems:
|
no |
"none" | "auto" | "force" |
|
if true and the file is an archive then its content will be unpacked and added as individual files |
no |
"true" | "false" |
|
Limit installation of this particular file to the given condition, which must be true during the file installation. |
no |
String - a valid condition ID |
casesensitive |
Whether to treat the file name case-sensitive. |
no |
"true" | "false" |
defaultExcludes |
Whether to use global default excludes. |
no |
"true" | "false" |
followSymLinks |
Whether to follow symbolic links on target systems which support them. |
no |
"true" | "false" |
Nested Elements
The following nested elements can be used in the <file> tag:
- <os>
Limit the installation of this file to conditions depending on the target OS, see below.
<additionaldata>
This tag can also be specified in order to pass additional data related to a file tag for customizing.
|
key to identify the data |
|
value which can be used by a custom action |
<singlefile>
- add a single file
Specifies a single file to include. The difference to <file>
is that this tag allows the file to be renamed, therefore it has a target attribute instead of targetdir
.
|
the file location (relative path). It may contain previously defined static variables (see |
|
the destination file name, could be something like |
|
can optionally specify a target operating system (unix, windows, mac) - this means that the file will only be installed on its target operating system |
|
see |
|
an id of a condition which has to be fullfilled to install this file |
An <additionaldata>
tag can also be specified for customizing.
<fileset>
- add a fileset
The <fileset>
tag allows files to be specified using the powerful Jakarta Ant set syntax. It takes the following parameters:
|
the base directory for the fileset (relative path) |
|
the destination path, works like for |
|
optionally lets you specify if the names are case- sensitive or not - takes yes or no |
|
optionally lets you specify if the default excludes will be used - takes yes or no. |
|
specifies the operating system, works like for |
|
see |
|
comma- or space-separated list of patterns of files that must be included; all files are included when omitted. This is an alternative for multiple include tags. |
|
comma- or space-separated list of patterns of files that must be excluded; no files (except default excludes) are excluded when omitted. This is an alternative for multiple exclude tags. |
|
an id of a condition which has to be fullfilled to install the files in this fileset |
You specify the files with <include> and <exclude> tags that take the name parameter to specify the Ant-like pattern :
**
: means any subdirectory
*
: used as a wildcard.
Here are some examples of Ant patterns :
|
will include lib and the subdirectories of lib |
|
will exclude any file in any directory starting from the base path ending by .java |
|
will include all the files ending by .jar in lib |
|
will exclude any file in any subdirectory starting from lib whose name contains FOO. |
There is a set of definitions that are excluded by default file-sets, just as in Ant. IzPack defaults to the Ant list of default excludes. There is currently no equivalent to the <defaultexcludes>
task. Default excludes are:
**/*\~{} **/\#*\# **/.\#* **/%*% **/.\_* **/CVS **/CVS/** **/.cvsignore **/SCCS **/SCCS/** **/vssver.scc **/.svn **/.svn/** **/.DS\_Store
An <additionaldata>
tag can also be specified for customizing.
<parsable>
- parse a file after installation
Files specified by <parsable>
are parsed after installation and may have variables substituted.
|
the file to parse, could be something like |
|
specifies the type (same as for the resources) - the default is plain |
|
specifies the file encoding |
|
specifies the operating system, works like for |
|
an id of a condition which has to be fullfilled to parse this file |
<executable>
- mark file as executable and optionally execute it
The <executable>
tag is a very useful thing if you need to execute something during the installation process. It can also be used to set the executable flag on Unix-like systems. Here are the attributes:
|
the file to run, could be something like |
|
If the executable is a jar file, this is the class to run for a Java program |
|
|
|
specifies when to launch :
|
|
specifies what to do when an error occurs:
|
|
specifies the operating system, works like for |
|
takes |
|
an id of a condition which has to be fullfilled to execute this file |
Takes an <args>
tag to pass one or more arguments (one <arg>
tag per argument) to the executable.
<arg>
passes the argument specified in the value
attribute. Slashes are handled special (see attribute targetfile of tag <parsable>
.
<os>
- make a file OS-dependent
The <os>
tag can be used inside the <file>
, <fileset>
, <singlefile>
, <parsable>
, <executable>
tags to restrict it's effect to a specific operating system family, architecture or version using the following attributes:
|
unix, windows, mac to specify the operating system family |
|
the operating system name |
|
the operating system version |
|
the operating system architecture (for instance the Linux kernel can run on i386, sparc, and so on) |
Example
<packs> (...) <pack name="Core" required="yes"> (...) <executable targetfile="$INSTALL_PATH/bin/compile" stage="never"> <os family="unix"/> </executable> (...) </pack> (...) </packs>
<refpack>
The <refpack>
takes only one attribute file
, which contains the relative path (from the installation compiler) to an externally defined packs-definition. This external packs definition is a regular IzPack installation XML. However the only elements that are used from that XML file are the <packs> and the <resources> elements.
This enables a model in which a single developer is responsible for maintaining the packs and resources (e.g. separate packsLang.xml_xyz files providing internationalization; see Internationalization of the PacksPanel) related to the development-package assigned to him. The main install XML references these xml-files to avoid synchronization efforts between the central installation XML and the developer-maintained installer XMLs.
Attributes
Attribute |
Description |
---|---|
|
Relative path during compile-time to an externally defined packs-definition |
<refpackset>
The <refpackset>
tag can be used in situations were there is no predefined set of <refpack>
files, but a given directory should be scanned for <refpack>
files to be included instead. This element takes the following parameters:
Attribute |
Description |
---|---|
|
Relative base directory during compile-time for the refpackset |
|
Pattern of files in |
Example:
<refpackset dir="" includes="**/refpack.xml" />
Internationalization of the PacksPanel
In order to provide internationalization for the PacksPanel, so that your users can be presented with a different name and description for each language you support, you have to create a file named packsLang.xml_xyz where xyz is the ISO3 code of the language in lowercase. Please be aware that case is significant. This file has to be inserted in the resources section of `` install.xml`` with the id and src attributes set at the name of the file. The format of these files is identical with the distribution langpack files located at `` $IZPACK_HOME/bin/langpacks/installer``. For the name of the panel you just use the pack id as the txt id. For the description you use the pack id suffixed with .description.
An example:
<resources> <res id="packsLang.xml_eng" src="i18n/myPacksLang.xml_eng"/> </resources>
The packsLang.xml_eng file:
<langpack> <str id="myApplication" txt="Main Application"/> <str id="myApplication.description" txt="A description of my main application"/> [...] </langpack>