Re: app-encapsulation and transparent-install (MS is doing it)

["Geoff Harrison (mandrake)" <mandrake mandrake net>]

On Fri, Sep 04, 1998 at 06:55:00PM -0700, David Jeske wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> I just wanted to follow up on some ideas I was throwing around here
> for stricter encapsulation of application data a while back. The next
> logical step, once app data is encapsulated strictly, is doing some
> kind of 'transparent-installation'. Something like how Marimba
> works(ed) for Java applications. In this model, the OS merely 'caches'
> application data, knowing it can get it out there somewhere should it
> need it again.
> 
> For example, if you launched "Netscape" and it didn't have it on your
> machine, it would traverse up a set of application servers to find it,
> and pull it down to your machine. If you later needed space for some
> other app, and it just absolutly had to, it could remove netscape from
> your disk, knowing that it could just regrab the same files off the
> network server later.

Call me old fashioned, but I believe that fire is magic.
And it frightens me.

but seriously, isn't that more the job of your shell?  A good foundation
for the idea, but IMNSHO that's more controlled at the shell level
than at the desktop level.

-- 
Geoff Harrison (http://mandrake.net)
Senior Systems Engineer
Intellimedia Commerce (http://www.intellimedia.com)
Author, MAW Shell Replacement (http://mandrake.net/MAW)
Author, Enlightenment Window Manager (http://www.enlightenment.org)
phone: (404)262-0001x102