Zero Install is a means of distributing and

packaging Packaging is the science, art and technology of enclosing or protecting products for distribution, storage, sale, and use. Packaging also refers to the process of designing, evaluating, and producing packages. Packaging can be described as a co ...

software Software is a set of computer programs and associated documentation and data. This is in contrast to hardware, from which the system is built and which actually performs the work. At the lowest programming level, executable code consists ...

for multiple operating systems (

Unix-like A Unix-like (sometimes referred to as UN*X or *nix) operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, although not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification. A Unix-li ...

including

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...

and

macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

Software

Rather than the normal method of downloading a software package, extracting it, and installing it before it can be used (with the accompanying use of

destructive update In computing, a persistent data structure or not ephemeral data structure is a data structure that always preserves the previous version of itself when it is modified. Such data structures are effectively immutable, as their operations do not ( ...

s and

privilege escalation Privilege escalation is the act of exploiting a bug, a design flaw, or a configuration oversight in an operating system or software application to gain elevated access to resources that are normally protected from an application or user. The res ...

), packages distributed using Zero Install only need be run. The first time software is accessed, it is downloaded from the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

and cached; subsequently, software is accessed from the cache. Inside the cache, each application unpacks to its own directory, as in

Application Directory An application directory is a grouping of software code, help files and resources that together comprise a complete software package but are presented to the user as a single object. They are currently used in RISC OS and the ROX Desktop, and a ...

systems. The system is intended to be used alongside a distribution's native package manager. Two advantages of Zero Install over more popular packaging systems are that it is

cross-platform In computing, cross-platform software (also called multi-platform software, platform-agnostic software, or platform-independent software) is computer software that is designed to work in several computing platforms. Some cross-platform software r ...

and no root password is needed to install software; packages can be installed in system locations writable by that user instead of requiring administrator access. Thus, package installation affects only the user installing it, which makes it possible for all users to be able to install and run new software. Moreover, the EBox sandbox can be used on top of Zero Install to securely install software and to run them in a restricted environment. Among the disadvantages of Zero Install is the fact that applications often need a rewrite for this packager, e.g., no absolute paths may be in use, among other requirements. The quality of Zero Install repository content varies and may contain unmaintained software.

Other uses of the term

Other uses of the term "Zero Install" exist which are unrelated to a specific software project. PaperCut software describes a "zero install strategy" for Windows networks, which involves configuring multiple terminals via methods such as a group policy, to run the client executable directly off a single share. This enables automatic updates for workstations in line with the server and avoids multiple, separate installation processes. The Yarn package manager describes a zero-install as a philosophy which seeks to limit failures by limiting the usage of Yarn commands and therefore limiting the number of opportunities for things to go wrong.

References

External links

* * * * * * {{Linux package management systems Cross-platform software Free package management systems Software distribution

Software

Other uses of the term

See also

References

External links