[PATCH] Nmap installer and vcredist

["Rob Nicholls" <robert () everythingeverything co uk>]

I didn't have time to test this properly before the 4.75 release, and I
didn't want to rush out an untested patch in case it messed up the new
stable release, but it's ready now.

The attached patch checks whether our version specific vcredist file has
previously been installed and skips the install if already present. If the
install is required it does an identical check afterwards to see if the
install was successful and display an error message (unless Nmap was
installed silently) if something went wrong:

http://www.everythingeverything.co.uk/files/vcredist_error.png

(ignore the corrupt looking icon in the top right corner, I was using remote
desktop to get to a Windows 2000 virtual machine viewed in the VMWare
client)

I've tested this on Vista SP1, XP SP3, fully patched 2000 Server (where it
appears to work as expected) and a clean install of 2000 Pro (where it
failed and displayed the error message).

I'm still a bit concerned that anyone performing a silent install may not
notice that the runtimes failed to install, as Nmap itself will still be
installed (it just won't execute due to a lack of DLLs). I'm a bit reluctant
to cancel the installation of Nmap just because the vcredist installer
doesn't appear to have been successful, as there could perhaps be a valid
reason (although I can't think of one) why it wasn't installed without
actually affecting Nmap's execution. 

FYI, I noticed earlier today that Microsoft have stated the following
requirements for the Visual C++ 2008 SP1 runtime components:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=a5c84275-3b97-4ab7-
a40d-3802b2af5fc2

System Requirements
Supported Operating Systems: Windows Server 2003; Windows Server 2008;
Windows Vista; Windows XP
Minimum: 6 MB (x86)
Required Software: Windows Installer 3.0 Windows Installer 3.1 or later is
recommended.

So it sounds like Microsoft are officially ditching support for Windows 2000
with the Visual C++ 2008 SP1 runtimes; however, I just installed it on a
fully patched Windows 2000 Server host and it seemed to think it was
successful. It's hard to get Visual C++ 2008 Express Edition without SP1
from Microsoft, but I presume we'll stick with 2008 RTM for the foreseeable
future?


Rob

Attachment: nmap_installer_better_vcredist_install.diff
Description:

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