Installation of custom components manually

[wladimir_frank]

Hello,

because the client-side Design Studio envirment is running on a terminal server and Dashboard Designer should not be respoinsible for installing/updating of custom components, our client likes to create some kind of 'installation/update script'  which automatically installs/updates the chosen custom components for a certain user.

For that, I need to know how to install an extension manually (with copy/paste of files & edit of file-content).

What I know so far:

- All responsible files for custom addons can be found in the Analysis-config folder within the user files.

- The generated plugin.jar goes into Analysis-config/plugin folder

- The generated feature.jar has to be unzipped and goes into Analysis-config/features folder

- The generated artifact.jar has to be unzipped and the 2 artifacts of the custom component within the XML go into the Analysis-config/artifact.xml file

     - In addition here: the feature-artifact of the custom component gets the following new attribute

<repositoryProperties size='1'>

        <property name='artifact.folder' value='true'/>

</repositoryProperties>

- Within the Analysis-config/config/org.eclipse.update/platform.xml file you have to add a new entry for the feature and its meta information

That's all I know so far.

However, if I follow the steps above (which I found out by myself), my addon does not appear within the Design Studio envirment as a new, custom component. If I install the add-on via the regular way (tools -> install custom extension) everything works fine.

Anyone likes to share his / her experience with such scripts / ideas ?

Thanks and kind regards

Wladimir

[former_member194504 · Accepted solution]

Hi wladimir,

For me its working, just by follwing the first two steps. Artifacts and config files seems to be auto generated. Can you try with only that first two steps?

Thanks,
Nithyanandam

[wladimir_frank · Accepted solution]

Hi Nithyanandam,

this works for me as well.

However:

I needed to restart Design Studio twice. The first time I started Design Studio, the plugin.xml got updated, the artifacts.xml not. The custom component was not visible for me.

The second time I started Design Studio, artifacts.xml got updated as well and the component was visible.

So not modifying the artifacts.xml & plugin.xml works, but (at least for me) only if I restart Design Studio twice. For my case, unfortunately, that is not a sufficient solution. The user gets confused and therefore might think that there is some kind 'bug' within our components.

More ideas anyone?

[Former Member]

Hello Wladmir.

Its great that you'd like to bring an automation to installation/updation of the custom components.

Just like  said Installation is going to be very simple with the first two steps or you could follow just the last step that you used, i.e., Tools --> Install Extensions.

But, when you need to update the same, you can take the following steps as direction

     1) Help->About-->Installation Details. And you can uninstall your previously installed extensions.

     2) Now in the artifacts.xml, you'll have to remove the script from

               <artifacts ..... >

                    ........

                         .......

               </artifacts>

     3) Install the latest suite of your Custom components/Extensions.

     4) Replace/Place the plugins folder in your Analysis-config

This should be working. Please try it on and let me know if this was effective enough to get your script done.

Please correct me if I was wrong in any part of my answer.

Thanks,

Anoo

[wladimir_frank]

Hi Anoo,

Using the regular installation routine with Tools -> Install Extensions is not the solution I’m looking for, because for this the script needs to log in into windows of a certain user and do stuff by ‘clicking’.

The script I'm looking for is being executed as an administrator and just replaces/edits files within the file system.

Regarding your update routine:

If you go on a higher version in your custom component, Design Studio automatically handles deleting the 'old' artifacts within artifacts.xml & old folders/files.

However the update routine you described is a nice workaround if you do not want to or you can't increase the version of your routine (for any reason).

[former_member187102]

Hi Wladimir,

  Paste the plugin jar files to the Plugins folder of Installation directory of the C:\Program Files\SAP BusinessObjects\Design Studio\plugins

It will add the plugin to eclipse instead of P2 architecture.