I love the idea for a native app to install Node :)

I just gave it spin. It showed me correctly that my node version is out of date and I could press the update button. And it seemed to have worked, but after it’s done it reverts to the same view again

Here is what the logs say:

$ npm start

> [email protected] start /Users/gregor/Projects/node-installer
> electron .

2016-07-01 17:29:21.339 Electron[44432:8884808] CFPropertyListCreateFromXMLData(): Old-style plist parser: missing semicolon in dictionary on line 3. Parsing will be abandoned. Break on _CFPropertyListMissingSemicolon to debug.
sudo: a password is required
installer: Package name is Node.js
installer: Installing at base path /
installer: The install was successful.

OS: Ubuntu 16.04
Current Node Version: 6.11.3 (installed through nvm)
I also have the latest version of node as a repo (but it's not installed into the system)
node is not installed as part of the system it's installed locally by my user

node -v : The program 'node' is currently not installed. You can install it by typing:
sudo apt install nodejs-legacy

nvm ls: 
->      v6.11.3
default -> system (-> N/A)
node -> stable (-> v6.11.3) (default)
stable -> 6.11 (-> v6.11.3) (default)
iojs -> N/A (default)
lts/* -> lts/boron (-> v6.11.3)
lts/argon -> v4.8.4 (-> N/A)
lts/boron -> v6.11.3

ok now moving on to the problem. Nodejs installer does show that I have version 6.11.3 installed, and has the Update to v8.7.0 button available. It also has the latest verison buttons that let's you install the stable and current versions of nodejs.

When I click on the update version I get the following error:

Command failed: [object Object] undefined tar --strip=1 -C /usr/local -oxf /tmp/node-v6.11.4-linux-x64.tar.gz /bin/sh: 1: [object: not found

Looking at the console I get the following error:

/home/jl/installer/src/renderer/components/App.jsx:61
failed: [object Object] undefined tar --strip=1 -C /usr/local -oxf /tmp/node-v6.11.4-linux-x64.tar.gz
/bin/sh: 1: [object: not found
    at ChildProcess.exithandler (child_process.js:217:12)
    at emitTwo (events.js:106:13)
    at ChildProcess.emit (events.js:194:7)
    at maybeClose (internal/child_process.js:899:16)
    at Process.ChildProcess._handle.onexit (internal/child_process.js:226:5)

attempting to install the stable version or current version from the latest versions button gives me the following error:

Error: Command failed: [object Object] undefined tar --strip=1 -C /usr/local -oxf /tmp/node-v6.11.4-linux-x64.tar.gz
/bin/sh: 1: [object: not found
    at ChildProcess.exithandler (child_process.js:217)
    at emitTwo (events.js:106)
    at ChildProcess.emit (events.js:194)
    at maybeClose (internal/child_process.js:899)
    at Process.ChildProcess._handle.onexit (internal/child_process.js:226)

(just change v6.11.4 to 8.7.0 )

It seems to me that it's not being able to download the tar to install said version, but Im not entirely sure because even when i click on update to v8.7.0 it tries to obtain the v6.11.4.

I assume there might be a problem with nvm and installer (having read some of the issues).

At the moment I'm trying to get it to work so that I can get used to the software and contribute in the future if possible.

So before fixing this possible issue (that could be just my mistake for having nvm alongside installer) is there a workaround so I can get this working properly?

Windows installer, retrieved from https://nodejs.org/dist/v16.13.1/node-v16.13.1-win-x64.zip (via https://nodejs.org/en/download/), on a display with the system scaler set to 250%, truncates various labels, rendering them unreadable. For example:

Windows 10, 64-bit

They should only open if the user is actually a developer.

Probably needs different code for both Mac, Windows and Linux.

We have had a lot of issues with the pkg installer (especially when upgrading from v4 -> a version that contains npm 3) not fully replacing npm.

Running the latest master, ead0461.

Trying to install a new node version.

First, this:

Then:

Renderer process console:

Main process console:

sudo: a password is required

At the very least, release notes for the latest builds should be included. This should eventually include a diff of release notes from currently installed build to latest, as well as highlighting security-related patches.

An app launched by a GUI launcher (Finder, Dock, Spotlight etc.) receives a pretty empty and useless environment, since standard Unix ways of setting variables via e.g. ~/.profile do not work.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/135688/setting-environment-variables-in-os-x

So, code exec('node --version' in the check-node.js doesn't work because node cannot be found (if you run app, not electron ., see #17).

Hi all!
I've spoken with a friend of mine who is a programmer but is completely new to Node.
I showed him the Installer asking his impression and he asked me why the installer prompts two different versions to install and why the update to button is not always consistent with the highest version number on the bottom of the left bar.
As you can easily image the problem was that he wasn't aware of the Node release line and he asked me why we didn't write a little explanation about this.

The answer was pretty obvious, all of us know how the release plan works, so we develop the interface omitting this detail.
I have removed the code example (who was there just for beauty) and I've added a brief description of the release line and more useful resources.

The Node.js release line is divided in different stages.
The most important are *LTS* and *Current*, which are the Long Term Support version and the Latest stable release.
You can find more information about the release plan [here](https://github.com/nodejs/LTS).

What do you think?
The text is just a draft, feel free to change it.
cc @nodejs/electron-installer

👋 Hey there! I come to you at the request from @MylesBorins and @jasnell. I've been working with Electron for a while and I'd like to help out with some hard-learned lessons and some best practices.

First up: Build pipeline. Building is one of the hardest things in the Electron world, as there are countless things to consider for each platform, each native dependency, and each build target. We in the Electron maintainer's group have realized that it's the easiest place to get lost, so there's now a common CLI (similar to ember-cli or create-react-app) that handles the whole build/package/make cycle. Called electron-forge, it reduces the common Electron development operations down to simple commands.

Given that this repo is still in its infancy, this might seem like overkill. However, once you start adding native dependencies and want to build multiple targets (dmg, zip, exe, msi, rpm, deb), you'll be happy that you don't have to worry about the many things required to turn a bundle of JavaScript into an executable 😉

Currently we are using native ES6 for all the code, are we going to consider using something like typescript (which we get for free with electron-forge) to write our main/renderer code?

Also for discussion, in terms of the renderer currently using flexboxgrid and some standard HTML / CSS. How do people feel about a UI framework like angular / react or sticking with the super basic HTML layouts?

Just thinking as the main process scaffolding comes in we may want to think about these kind of things early on in the process

With nvm installed, it seems that the install of an updated version doesn't quite work. After updating from the installer, the binary is installed in /usr/bin/local/, but $ which node shows that nvm still has the global node. (Example output: /Users/rylewis/.nvm/versions/node/v6.2.0/bin/node).

It would be nice to either detect that a version manager is being used and message something, or perhaps override the location of node (this might be a little destructive and may need to do some specific messaging).

This should definitely be enabled by default. The amount of times I have (and I'm sure other people have) skipped this step then tried to install native modules, only to face hours of headache, is insane.

The app currently doesn't have a window menu. You might see one when you run the app in developer mode, but said window menu will no longer be there once you compile the application (that's a feature implemented by the electron command).

Why is this included in the installer?

https://github.com/nodejs/installer/blob/master/src/renderer/lib/examples.js

It is currently very terse. It should be much nicer and guide people along.

@nodejs/help @nodejs/inclusivity

When the app launches, a white flash is visible. That's just the index.html loading.

We are going through all of the node.js repositories to rename the primary branch to main. Please see nodejs/node#33864 for more context.

I also don't see any githbub workflows so I don't think there should be issues with the rename.

Please let me know if there are any concerns otherwise I'll look to do the rename Friday May 4th.

Hi all!
Is this project dead? Suspended? Waiting for some decision from version-management?

Thanks!

cc: @mikeal @addaleax

The Installer has issues when I'm behind our corporate proxy.

I haven't found network settings in C:\Users\<Profile>\AppData\Roaming\installer\preferences.

So for some unknown historical reason node core has a Windows installer (probably to appease the MS gods)...
After a recent conversation with @ljharb, IMHO the installer should be in this WG's focus, since it's essentially a "management-challenged" version manager....
We are fielding issues as:

• Allow multiple installs of Node on Windows with msi
• Stop the installer deleting my symlink for AppData\Roaming\npm
• Windows installer: Per user install (feature request)
  and the list goes on...

Which bring up the same issues that are discussed here, like:

• where do we put the global node_modules?
• Should we install npm or not, and where?
• Does core want to officially support side-by-side multi-version, and if so how to switch versions (i.e. version manager yes or no)?
• How to detect which version are installed?

Not to diminish from this WG's efforts in the least, and not intending to step on anyone's toes!!!
It's just that our questions are less "academic" since they are motivated by issues opened by users, since the Windows installer is unfortunately an existing core feature 🤦‍♂️ So we need to answer them sooner rather than later...
BTW: Personally my prefered answer would have been "The Windows installer is deprecated, use the zipped package or a userland version manager" but it got push-back nodejs/node#4603 (comment)

/cc @tniessen @nodejs/platform-windows

Please add License info to the README. The package.json says it is Apache-2.0.

That's obviously not intended 😆

The app currently does not have a context menu (and is hence missing the default operations like Cut, Copy, or Paste).

Hi all,
while we are discussing about code style and other stuff, I want to open another topic: the Installer UI.

I made some experiments, and I've created this, what do you think?
Any constructive suggestion is welcome!

If you like it, I can start to write some code :)

I just tried this thing out. It told me I have node version 6.2.1 and gave me an option to upgrade. I clicked the button and now I have the latest node. Magic!

✨ 💻 ✨