[Appleman]

Say I install Panther on a PowerBook. It then understands it needs to install certain PowerBook only apps like the scrollpad etc.
If I still use a original iMac Bondi Blue, it understands I have infrared, so it will install that in the System Preferences.

Now I have an external harddisk. I insert my installation disks of Panther in a certain Mac type A, and install Panther on this external harddisk.

Later on I want to start up from this external harddisk on a Mac type B. Does it understand I suddenly do not have an infrared port anymore, but f.i. do have a scrollpad?
How does this work?

Can I use an iPod, loaded with Panther, in order to start up a PowerMac G5 when this isn't starting up from it's own harddisks?

Just curious, nothing wrong happened.
Thanks.

P.S. I guess Charles should know about this

[Angus_D]

What generally happens is that it installs everything, but certain things are only enabled/exposed via the UI if the hardware supports them.

[Millennium]

Ordinarily, it just unpacks the program into your hard drive, not unlike uncompressing a tarball, only using a program called pax, which is not terribly good about obeying existing permissions and links. This means that unless you are VERY careful when you build an installer, it will screw up permissions on the hard drives of anyone who uses the installer. Even Apple seldom gets it right, which is unfortunate. The installer can also check the hard drive for you and do some other interesting things, but these are not actually part of the installation process.

It is, however, possible to create a metapackage, which chains several packages (installations) together. This makes customizable installers possible. It's also possible to use scripts to determine which packages should be used and which should not, which allows you to make installers sensitive to the type of machine they're installed on.

All of this said, Angus' post is correct about how OSX is installed. I've only described what is possible, not what Apple actually does.

[asxless]

I'm beginning to believe that it _does_ matter which computer you were running when you did the install of OSX. Heres why...

I recently purchased 1.67 MHx 15' PowerBook running Panther 10.3.7. My wife's dual 1GHz PowerMac G4 is still running Jaguar, so I suggested that she upgrade But since Tiger's release is "imminent", she declined. In order to convince her that it was still worth upgrading now, I suggested that she _temporarily_ run off a clone of my PowerBook's drive just to see what she was missing. [BTW this is quite easy to do since we always install the OS & Apps in a separate partition from our data.] I used ASR (command iine) to clone the clone of my PowerBook's drive that had made immediately after I got it. My PowerBook (hence the clone) came with 10.3.7 so I updated her 'clone' to 10.3.8 and did a complete install of her mission critical apps from CD/DVD. This allowed her to boot from either Jaguar or Panther and do a 'taste test'.

My wife is a graphic artist, so we used Font Book to disable Apple's built in TrueType version of several fonts that she requires to be Type 1 PostScript fonts ( e.g. Helvetica, Times etc.) . She used Panther for nearly a day with various Macromedia/Adobe apps before reporting "flaky behavior". Rather than diagnosing the 'flakey behavior' during her work day, we re-booted her PowerMac back into Jaguar and everything was fine, allowing her to complete her project. Later that evening, I rebooted her PowerMac back into Panther and discovered that it was indeed a very sick puppy Lots of simple stuff would simply hang (i.e. quit responding). For example,
* Disk Utility would hang as soon as I selected a volume,
* System preferences would hang when selecting Accounts.

These two were kind of important since I was trying to use Disk Utility to repair permissions, etc. and Accounts to change the default login.

FWIW I have since done a full Apple Hardware Test (passed), applied the 10.3.8 "combo update", repaired permissions and...
Panther is still a sick puppy on her PowerMac. OTOH Jaguar is still running just fine

Needless to say, she won't even consider upgrading to Panther now

-- asxless in iLand

ps My PowerBook's "Mac OS X Install Disc" is a dual layer DVD with lots of small packages ending in .mpkg (meta package?). So I'm guessing that it actually does a "custom install" of at least some components of the OS and bundled apps.

[CharlesS]

The OS X discs that come bundled with Macs usually are tailored to that specific model, so YMMV when trying to load from one of those onto a different machine than it was intended for. With the stock Panther discs, though, it should just always install everything, AFAIK.

And you know, I kind of agree with your wife. Jaguar's working fine for her now, and it won't be that long before Tiger's released (according to Steve, by this summer). Panther is great, but Tiger will be lots better, and why should she have to pay $130 for Panther when that same money will get her Tiger in just a few months?

[asxless]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
...And you know, I kind of agree with your wife. Jaguar's working fine for her now, and it won't be that long before Tiger's released (according to Steve, by this summer). Panther is great, but Tiger will be lots better, and why should she have to pay $130 for Panther when that same money will get her Tiger in just a few months?

She'll be glad to hear an uber-geek agrees with her

But AFAIK a license for Tiger will not include a "retro" license to use Panther while Apple and 3rd party hardware/software vendors get those little incompatabilites worked out. Based on previous OS X releases (and major OS releases in general), that could take even a few more months (e.g. until 10.4.2). So it will likely be nearly Christmas before our mission critical Macs will be able to be upgraded to Tiger AND have full functionality.

For example, my brand new PowerBook came with OS X 10.3.7 and it still had HP printer drivers which were incompatible with Fast User Switching

-- asxless in iLand

[CharlesS]

Originally posted by asxless:
She'll be glad to hear an uber-geek agrees with her

But AFAIK a license for Tiger will not include a "retro" license to use Panther while Apple and 3rd party hardware/software vendors get those little incompatabilites worked out. Based on previous OS X releases (and major OS releases in general), that could take even a few more months (e.g. until 10.4.2). So it will likely be nearly Christmas before our mission critical Macs will be able to be upgraded to Tiger AND have full functionality.

For example, my brand new PowerBook came with OS X 10.3.7 and it still had HP printer drivers which were incompatible with Fast User Switching

-- asxless in iLand

Bah, as an "uber-geek" , I've installed every release of OS X as soon as it came out, and haven't had any problems so far.

Your example of a printer driver not working with Fast User Switching would be easily dealt with by not turning Fast User Switching on - you'd still have had much more functionality than with Jaguar. And that sounds like the kind of problem that would be HP's fault rather than Apple's...

[asxless]

Originally posted by CharlesS:
Bah, as an "uber-geek" , I've installed every release of OS X as soon as it came out, and haven't had any problems so far.

Your example of a printer driver not working with Fast User Switching would be easily dealt with by not turning Fast User Switching on - you'd still have had much more functionality than with Jaguar. And that sounds like the kind of problem that would be HP's fault rather than Apple's...

I'm sure someone with over 5000 posts on MacNN alone, can install "every release of OS X as soon as it came out, and haven't had any problems so far.". But mere mortals may not want to spend much time diagnosing OS/3rd party compatibility issues, let alone, finding and implementing the work arounds For some reason my wife's clients don't pay us to figure out why her printer isn't working.

BTW I really don't care whether the HP driver & FUS conflict is Apple's or HP's "fault". The net result was that even after 7 updates to 10.3, this kind of conflict still existed with the OS & drivers on the install disc that came with a brand new computer. Of course these conflicts can happen at any time but they _usually_ happen more frequently just after the release of a new version of the OS. So we don't install new OS releases on mission critical computers for at least several months. The additional functionality maybe nice to have, but stability is a requirement.

-- asxless in iLand

[bowwowman]

My PowerBook's "Mac OS X Install Disc" is a dual layer DVD with lots of small packages ending in .mpkg (meta package?).

".mpkg" stands for "make package" which basically means..... hey you Mac, make a spot in your directory for this software, cause here it comes

So I'm guessing that it actually does a "custom install" of at least some components of the OS and bundled apps.

Powerbook disks do install components necessary for laptops, like trackpad controls ect...
And using those disks to install OS X onto another machine is a violation of the user liscense.......ie piracy by any other name nonono

I'm sure someone with over 5000 posts on MacNN alone, can install "every release of OS X as soon as it came out, and haven't had any problems so far.".

Well, I have ONLY 200+ posts, and I have also installed EVERY OS X release from 10.0 to 10.3.8 onto a B&W, and have had ZERO problems either, hehehe.........guess I'm a notch above mortals too

[goMac]

Originally posted by bowwowman:
".mpkg" stands for "make package" which basically means..... hey you Mac, make a spot in your directory for this software, cause here it comes

.mpkg stands for meta package. A meta package contains multiple packages, allowing you to pick and choose which parts of the installer you want to install. For example, the Mac OS X installer meta package contains packages for BSD Subsystem, Essential Files, Applications, Fonts, Print Drivers, etc.

Also Powerbook disks do not include special drivers. I use them on normal machines all the time. OS X installers will usually install the same files on any machine. We have a rebuild server at work that loads the same images on all machines.

There are two nonos however. G5 images will not work on a G4/G3 and G3/G4 images will not work on a G5. Also, the image being installed must be newer than the OS the machine shipped with, or else there could be missing drivers.

To add to the complications, updates on Software Update now only install needed components for that machine. In order to make sure a OS will work on all machines, you have to use the full updaters off of Apple's site.

[Detrius]

Originally posted by goMac:
...G5 images will not work on a G4/G3 and G3/G4 images will not work on a G5...

That's only true of 10.2. It's not true of 10.3.

[Detrius]

Originally posted by asxless:
...BTW I really don't care whether the HP driver & FUS conflict is Apple's or HP's "fault". The net result was that even after 7 updates to 10.3, this kind of conflict still existed with the OS & drivers on the install disc that came with a brand new computer...

It's not Apple's responsibility to make sure that you have the latest, greatest third party hardware drivers. You should be able to go to HP's website on your own and download newer drivers if they are available--especially if you are having problems. You can't blame Apple for not having the newest third party drivers. At least you had some kind of drivers.

[asxless]

Originally posted by Detrius:
It's not Apple's responsibility to make sure that you have the latest, greatest third party hardware drivers. You should be able to go to HP's website on your own and download newer drivers if they are available--especially if you are having problems. You can't blame Apple for not having the newest third party drivers. At least you had some kind of drivers.

I never said that it was "Apple's responsibility to make sure that you[I] have the latest, greatest third party hardware drivers.". You completely missed the point.

What I was saying is that this kind of compatibility issue, between a major hardware vendor and FUS (a key feature of Panther, at least according to Apple's OS X pages) still existed after SEVEN updates to Panther. And that was an example of why I don't install release 1.0 of any OS on _mission critical_ Macs. The number of such issues is almost always higher on v1.0 than v7.0.

-- asxless in iLand

[goMac]

Originally posted by Detrius:
That's only true of 10.2. It's not true of 10.3.

Hey! Another reason to push our department to finally upgrade everyone's licenses to 10.3.