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Cosmin2
Contributor
Contributor

"mixed" distribution

Hi.
Is it possible to make a "mixed" distribution?
For example a program could load some files and registry settings from that "virtual environment" but it will load most of the files locally from a folder near the exe/dat files.
Why am I asking this: because there are some large programs (Autocad for example) in which most of the files don't need to be in that "virtual environment" + decreasing the size of the dat file will dramatically decrease its access time and increase its reading speed.
Just a thought...

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Cievo
Commander
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I don't think it would be problem. Virtualized application is just difference between system before installation and afterwards. Virtualized application sees native files and registries.

I see one problem and that's how to divide those files. It would be really harder job. You would extract those files from installation. Put som into ThinApp project and put som on all computers which will use application.

Other thing is why would you do such a division? Data container can be huge, only needed files (blocks) are streamed.

***Good question is half of the answer...***
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Cosmin2
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I'm not so sure that it's that easy.

For example an application is installed in "C:\Program Files\Application_name". Inside the folder there are Data1 and Data2 folders.

After "capturing" near the exe and dat files it's a "Data" folder with Data1 and Data2 folders. The virtual environment should "tell" to the program that "Data\Data1" is "C:\Program Files\Application_name\Data1" and "Data\Data2" is "C:\Program Files\Application_name\Data2" so the application should load its data.

But how do I set the virtual environment to do this?

Why do I wanna do this? Because I noticed that if the dat file is larger the access time increases and reading speed decreases. So I'm thinking that decreasing its size would help.

Of course, accessing and reading from folder is time consuming also but I'm thinking it will read faster if it's a real folder, not virtualized in a dat file.

Just a thought...

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Cosmin2
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I just did a test with Autocad 2010 LT.

With all the data in dat file (724 MB) it loaded in 37 seconds.

With Program Files folder loaded from the real computer (185 MB dat file) it loaded in 14 seconds.

I restarted the computer before each test so the files/folders would not be cached (and Prefetch is disabled).

I will try with a larger version tommorow...

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Cievo
Commander
Commander

In this setup you have to copy all "not needed" huge data to all computers which will use aplication.

There is no native way in ThinApp to say application which data are where, but only way I wrote in my first post. But it looks you understood it. I see only one way to use it and it's for not common used and huge packages.

Let us know your testing results.

Thank you,

***Good question is half of the answer...***
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Cosmin2
Contributor
Contributor

Ok.

I tried with Autocad Map 3D 2010.

The dat file had 2.3 GB and the loading time was 55 seconds.

I lowered it to 580 MB and the loading time to 31 seconds.

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Cosmin2
Contributor
Contributor

I tried with Office 2007.

I moved the files from %ProgramFilesDir% to "C:\Program Files" and from %Program Files Common% to "c:\Program Files\Common Files".
In %ProgramFilesDir% and %Program Files Common% I kept the folder tree, ##Atributes.ini (with Isolation set to Merged) and the exe files used in Package.ini.
In most ini files Isolation was set to Full, I hope it's not a problem that I changed to Merged.

Word and Excel seem to start fine (for now) but Powerpoint shows Windows Error.

Error signature:

AppName: powerpnt.exe     AppVer: 12.0.6500.5000     ModName: ppcore.dll
ModVer: 12.0.6535.5002     Offset: 00006466

What am I doing wrong...?

Thank you for any idea...

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