Hi Maarten, > Looks very simple indeed. Simple fileformat also. The only problem I > foresee, for the OOo project, is that this is yet another file which > needs to be updated manually. But we might automate this process using > some file generating app (the openoffice.org-server doesn't support much > manual scripting), maybe the base of this file generation could even be > such metalink file ;). I have no other objections at the offering this > to end users.
Thanks for taking the time to check this out and for your comments. Yes, I have tried to make it as simple as possible for the end user along with the file format. I'm glad it comes across that way ;) Yes, manually updating the file would be a huge pain. I am not a programmer, but hope it easily could be automatically generated. Interesting idea about the metalink file being the base of the file generation. What language do you think would be good for the OOo project? Doesn't OOo already have a list of Mirrors/filenames/languages/OS for the JS download page? Maybe that could be modified. Even if the file is a little out of date, download managers will drop the dead links and use other ones. So say there were 30 links in the .metalink and 25 were down - those 5 would probably be more useful than 1. (Eventually a server daemon to communicate between mirrors would be good). > A question I have is how will one decide for OS/Language. Is that a > preference in the download software? Can it easily be overridden (guess > that would be software dependent)? Yes, OS, language, and geographic location are preferences (set once) that can be configured in the download manager. The default behavior will be to download only files for your OS/language combination. But, there will be options for advanced users to download the other files described in a .metalink file in case they need other versions. > Good luck with your effort. The idea is very simple but can indeed be > very powerful! Thanks, I hope so too! FlashGot (cross platform Firefox extension, http://www.flashgot.net/whats) plans to add it in the next week or so. The new download page looks very nice btw :) ant anthony l. bryan wrote: > Hi everyone, > > I sent this to [EMAIL PROTECTED] & Louis suggested I send it here as well. > > My file distribution project (Metalink) is getting close to done. > I wanted to invite any of you on Windows to try it out if you have time, or > to take a look at the video of it in action. > > It has been implemented with OOo in mind. I think it would simplify the > current download process. Instead of manually selecting Language, OS, & > download site, all this info is contained in a file that a download manager > processes, automatically selects the correct OS/language combo, and has > access to all the mirror locations for segmented downloads. This is all with > a single click, no dropdowns. So someone on Solaris-Sparc speaking Japanese > and another person on Linux-x86 speaking Brazilian Portugese would click the > same link but get the right OOo install file that they need. (There would > have to be 2 links, one for JRE & one for w/o). This might not make sense, > but please watch the video, it explains things better than I can. > > http://rapidshare.de/files/14479837/metalink_demo_800.avi.html > > I'm not claiming to have made segmented/accelerated/multi-threaded > downloading, I just think this makes it easier than manually finding and > adding mirror locations for end users. This is easier, faster, and more > reliable than one segment downloading. It also has automatic MD5/SHA-1 > checksum verification & P2P integration. This is only in GetRight (Windows) > right now, but can be added to download managers on other OSes easily. > > If you have any questions, please let me know or check out the project's > site at http://www.metalinker.org/ . There's a link to GetRight on there & > links on the Samples page if you want to test it out. The .metalink files > are just XML files you can view w/ a text editor. --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
