coapp-developers team mailing list archive

[Eric Schultz <wwahammy@xxxxxxxxx>]

Gang,

I've got mkPackage working reasonably well for non-application packages. I'm
starting to think about what type of modifications each type of package
should be able to perform to the system whether it be adding something to
the system PATH variable or creating a variable (like Wix does), registering
itself through the registry with some type of application (a Windows
Explorer extension perhaps) or through some other method or any other type
of modifications it should be able to perform to the system.

To the best of my knowledge the main restrictions regarding system
modifications for CoApp packages are they must use the CoApp directory
structure and that if they're an application, they can only add an icon in
the start menu. Here are some questions though:

- How much registry access do application packages receive? Same as any MSI
installer or do we restrict it in some way?
- Same thing with system variables like PATH.

- Are non-application packages allowed to modify the registry? (Drivers
obviously have to but since they use DIFx, that's a little different)
- Same thing with system variables.

- What if an add-on to an app doesn't register itself via the registry,
Visual Studio Extensions for example? Do we allow them to call executables
from the installer? If not, how do we handle this situation (obviously not
Custom Actions)?

Eric