Extend service capabilities to allow GUI clients

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Hi there,

I like the idea of communicating with a central service that does all the 
installation stuff as it offers some more possibilities for my users. I have 
successfully created a small GUI application allowing a user to click on a 
"Install software"-button which tells the service to "Execute" wpkg.js, so a 
reboot is not necessarily needed. However, I'd like to give my users some more 
info about what will be done when they click on the button. One thing I'd like 
to display is a list of packages that would be installed/updated/removed. To 
achive this, I'd have to execute wpkg.js myself with the /Query parameter set, 
parse it's output and build that list by myself. This, however, would break my 
security settings as all my users would need access to the wpkg-share on my 
server, which is currently only readable for a dedicated user that is used by 
the WPKG-gp service.

I was thinking about this stuff and would like to suggest the following 
enhancements:
- Let the WPKG-gp service execute the "query-for-what-I-am-interested-in"-stuff 
on a regular basis, say all five minutes (one should be able to configure this 
time). The service should parse the output, build a list of packages to 
install/upgrade/remove and store it internally.
- Add a new "pipe"-command "Query" or someting that a client could issue. If 
the service receives this command, it should return the list of packages, 
including their specific status. One package per line, including old and new 
revision (on upgrade) or currect revision only (on installed and remove). There 
should be some kind or status marker in the line.

I am willing to create the client frontend and add it here for the public to 
download. However, I am not a C++ or something else programmer. My language of 
choice is the AutoIT scripting language.

Regards

Original issue reported on code.google.com by goo...@daooze.de on 10 Feb 2011 at 10:15

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Hi, a gui residing in the system tray is on my todolist as well and have been 
playing with a prototype here..

I would prefer to continue to use python as the development platform, but would 
appreciate if you could provide a "mockup" or some ideas on how it should work.

The query command will definately be implemented.

-CL

Original comment by clei...@gmail.com on 11 Feb 2011 at 1:06

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Original comment by clei...@gmail.com on 27 Jun 2011 at 2:43

• Changed state: Accepted

[GoogleCodeExporter]

I have written a GUI client, created in Freepascal/Lazarus. It displays a list 
of packages to be added/removed/upgraded by reading the XML files directly, and 
can trigger execution of either wpkg-gp or the classic WPKG client. 

The list of actions to be performed is not as accurate as running wpkg.js, 
since installation status checks are not run, but it is a hell of a lot 
quicker, and is good enough for my purposes.

Original comment by neb...@gmail.com on 24 Jul 2011 at 8:51

[GoogleCodeExporter]

You might run WPKG in dryrun mode to fetch the changes which would be performed 
if you run it in normal mode. Then show the changes (parse the output) to the 
user so he could decide whether he wants to trigger the update or not.

Original comment by rainer.m...@gmail.com on 13 Aug 2011 at 9:39

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Hi,

 As Rainer has popped in to comment, I thought I'd mention a slightly more general idea that might be something that WPKG itself could absorb and offer to WPKG-GP, WPKGExpress etc. Roughly speaking, it would useful if WPKG could generate a simple machine readable summary of package status rather than have people parse the query/dryrun data or wade through log files. Maybe something simple like a CSV file report?

 It could be as simple as;
 "<packagename>", <boolean/0/1 isinstalled>
or
 "<packagename>",<boolean/0/1 isinstalled>, <last-error-code>
etc

 I hope the pseudo notation makes sense...

 Something like that opens up avenues for people write simple reporting systems for the status of each computer they use WPKG on.

Keefy

Original comment by kej.andr...@gmail.com on 9 Sep 2011 at 10:35

[GoogleCodeExporter]

There is possibility to make this interface available?

Original comment by jacksonf...@gmail.com on 2 Apr 2012 at 7:51