[wxPython-users] [Absolutely-OT] Vista Users

[Werner F. Bruhin]

Hi Andrea,

Andrea Gavana wrote:
> Hi All,
>  
>     I apologize in advance for the (probably) most off-topic thread of 
> the century. I have been reading quite a lot of material about Windows 
> Vista, but I haven't seen such a "Wow Effect" in general. In the wx* 
> community, it seems that the spread of the new OS is far below what it 
> was expected. I have no idea how wxPython apps look like on Vista, and 
> as usual I am hungry of screenshots if someone could be so kind to 
> provide one (maybe of the demo?) :-D
Yes, the "Wow effect" is mostly if not all MS marketing hype.  I would 
not upgrade an existing machine unless it is very very recent.  I mainly 
got a computer with Vista as I had planned to get a new PC anyhow, and 
Dell (were I get my PC's from) only does Vista for some time now (also I 
heard something that they will also offer Linux soon) and as some users 
reported problems with my app on Vista.

Problems with my app were:
- issues with listctrl fixed in wxPython 2.8
- a couple issue with my installer
a) had things like error log files in "program files/myapp/prog" with 
the new UAC "program files" should only contain program files, i.e. a 
normal user has no write access to that folder hierarchy.   Moved the 
error log files to a  folder under "users/yourlogin/myapp".
b) Installer should not offer to run application at end of installation 
(as at that point the admin user is active and not the user running the 
installation)

Other things to watch out on Vista installer (the ones I remember):
a) watch out how you use the registry.  A normal user only has write 
access to HKCU, they can read from the others.
b) make sure that the icon you assign to your application scales nicely 
(e.g. have a icon file with 16, 32 and 48 pixel versions), otherwise it 
will look ugly in the MS Explorer
c) localization can be confusing (I got a French Vista version - I am 
not sure that was that good an idea, as I am searching things pretty 
often, but it also allowed me to see things like this) so Program Files 
is called Programmes in the MS Explorer but when you go to e.g. a 
command prompt and dir C you will see Program Files.  If you look for 
one of these "localized" folders in your installer or program you can 
use the English name.
d) WinHelp is not supported (except with a user download), so you should 
use HTML help

> However, I have read so many Bad Things about Vista; a friend of mine, 
> an hardware/software expert who usually builds my machines assembling 
> components for faster computing, almost laughed at me whan I asked him 
> about Vista and still refuses to include Vista on new computers he 
> sells. I was just curious to know about the 
> feelings/performances/issues of wxPython-Vista users: I believe 
> Werner has a working Vista installation, but my memory might fail here.
> I don't have any plan to upgrade soon from XP (it works too well for 
> me). In any case, the profusion of negative-oriented articles about 
> Vista I am finding on the net will probably force me to eat my ancient 
> words [1] and switch to Linux when an upgrade will absolutely be 
> necessary.
I had quit a lot of applications I had to get new versions for, but 
beside that the installation was quit painless and I think it is at 
least as stable as XP is.

Werner

P.S.  I send you a few screen shots to you directly.