feeks Posted March 27, 2009 Report Share Posted March 27, 2009 Interesting, I have been using an app for the last couple of weeks called updatenotifier (http://cleansofts.org), which does similar things except manually for the download side of the house. What they do though that I think would be extremely useful in Ketarin is a scan of the local machine for application installs. They appear to be building a database (online) of apps and have other things in mind for that facility. This could be used as a very good starting point for the input of applications. Tie that in with the software update searches that other folks are looking at and you have an extremely powerful and useful app. Keep up the great work! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stalker Posted March 27, 2009 Report Share Posted March 27, 2009 The purpose of Ketarin is not to keep your machine up to date but to keep your distribution up to date. And as far as it goes there's simply no one better at the job than Ketarin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
feeks Posted March 27, 2009 Report Share Posted March 27, 2009 The purpose of Ketarin is not to keep your machine up to date but to keep your distribution up to date. And as far as it goes there's simply no one better at the job than Ketarin. I am not disputing that - I am simply saying - what better starting point for your distribution update than the workstation as a reference point. I can clearly see that Ketarin is capable of obtaining additional resources. The functional advantage that Update Notifier has is that it uses the workstation as a reference point! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stalker Posted March 27, 2009 Report Share Posted March 27, 2009 Sorry, misunderstood you. And yeah, I think it would be kinda cool to have a feature like that. Could be based on app detecting templates like CCleaner has. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CybTekSol Posted March 28, 2009 Report Share Posted March 28, 2009 There was a time when I could envision an application such as Ketarin eventually being able to inventory your locally installed apps and based on a variety of built-in templates covering all the major download sites, create app entries automatically for you. However, after today in which I have noticed how vulnerable app entries (especially those based on templates) are to download site changes, which may not be correctable, I have been jolted back to reality. This goal may never be achieved as a result of the volatility (and inconsistencies) of download site design. The only way that I can conceive of this happening is if the application author is also the owner of a MAJOR download site with unlimited bandwidth and has control of the site's design to provide reliability. This is unrealistic as far as I can see for anytime in the near future. I can only dream. In the interim, Ketarin is still light-years ahead of the old way I accomplished this... manually! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
appyface Posted March 28, 2009 Report Share Posted March 28, 2009 My $0.02 USD FWIW... I had been looking for a program like Ketarin for a LONG time and kept thinking, "I wonder why no one has this? I guess I will have to write this myself..." when out of the blue I stumbled upon Ketarin! So, to me, my dream app in Ketarin has been realized. However, I still face the issue of keeping all the machines in the home network installed with current updates. (My own home network is not much of a problem, I have XP Pro and several networking tools I use.) Most home folk I know, have XP Home (or maybe Vista Home flavor) and are limited in automated networking choices. So instead of adding the updater capability to Ketarin, I'd like to see a COMPANION app to Ketarin, that handles this next step... keeping machines up-to-date with installed programs they're using. To digress, I have experimented with Windows Home Server, and also with various LAN packages that take inventories, push out updates, licenses, etc. Most of these run from a central location and require domain controller, WMI, active directory, or other centralized networking solution. All fine for Corporate use. The focus of these apps is client-less install, running everything from central server and logging in to client machines to take the inventory remotely via remote registry, remote WMI, etc. They then use SMS or similar model for distribution and installation of new programs and/or updates. WHS does make sense for some folk. But for most I know they simply have a few PC's connected to a Broadband router, and that's the ONLY reason they actually have a "LAN"! So... I would have Ketarin reside on only ONE machine in the home network, and maintain the db and the distribution base of installers for ALL machines in the home network. My hypothetical companion app, then, would be installed on each machine in the home network, and would maintain all of its information directly on the local machine too. We're usually talking a handful of machines connected to a broadband router, so while central administration is nice it is just not a necessity. Local installation eliminates ALL the problems with handling remote inventories of these machines. This companion app would read Ketarin's database via UNC path (or drive letter if preferred), it should be able to supply credentials to login to remote "Ketarin machine" if so configured, and compare the local inventory to what Ketarin's db has got. (An actual inventory via installed apps and updates is very good, but some apps don't provide version and other info when they install. So this companion app would need to maintain a local db with additional info about the installed app, gleaned from other sources... Ketarin db version variables maybe, or date/time stamp on the installed executable, or read the version information from the EXE... etc. etc. etc. Not foolproof, but better than not having any info about the currently intalled app.) The companion app has many options on what it can do next, after comparing the local machine in some fashion to Ketarin's db. Some ideas are: 1. It could simply give a list of differences from Ketarin's distribution and apps installed/supposedly installed on the local machine. 2. It could copy the apps from Ketarin's distribution over to local machine and give list. 3. It could launch the copied apps (attended install) after they've all been copied. 4. Or perhaps it doesn't copy but launches the apps from UNC path to Ketarin's distribution instead (for apps that are friendly to this method). 5. If the app installer offers silent install (from either local copy or UNC path) have option to launch it and provide the command line info to cause the silent install. Ketarin was the first "dream app" I saw realized... and I immediately started thinking about the above as the perfect companion app to Ketarin! (Flo just read this post and has suddenly gone into hiding, muttering something about "...some people are never satisfied..." LOL I'm not hopeful I can convince Flo to write this companion app to Ketarin anytime soon.) I'm all for keeping the focus on Ketarin to improve at doing what it was designed to do -- fetch all the wanted installers -- and think about a companion app that can leverage Ketarin's db and already-downloaded apps, to take that next step and install the updates in machines on the home network. Again just my $0.02 USD on this topic... Someday... --appyface Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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