disappointed in Mac OS X package

[kokorozashi]

I've just had a terrible out-of-box experience after downloading and installing lps-2.2-macosx.pkg.sit on Mac OS 10.3.5. My web browser is Safari 1.2.3.

First, the installer seems to finish and then opens "Laszlo Explorer.command", which is a script file to which a custom icon has been added, apparently using Resorcerer. So rather than the script running, Resorcerer opens and shows me the icon resources in the resource fork of the script file. Um, hello? I'm a developer. I can be expected to have Resorcerer. Happily, I can also figure out what the problem was, but this is pretty silly.

So I launch Terminal and cd to the directory in which this file resides and execute it from the command line. Sadly, it fails. I get this error message:

2004-10-07 22:26:41.132 open[1258] LSOpenFromURLSpec() returned -43 for application (null) path /Server/lps-2.2/lps/utils/startup.html.

Well, yeah, it does make sense that LSOpenFromURLSpec wouldn't be able to find an application with which to open a document on a path which doesn't exist. I don't have a /Server. Maybe it meant ./Server... So I figure out which file it was trying to open... but by then I've gotten some more mysterious messages to interpret:

Using CATALINA_BASE: /Volumes/Big/Applications/Laszlo Presentation Server 2.2/Server/tomcat-5.0.24
Using CATALINA_HOME: /Volumes/Big/Applications/Laszlo Presentation Server 2.2/Server/tomcat-5.0.24
Using CATALINA_TMPDIR: /Volumes/Big/Applications/Laszlo Presentation Server 2.2/Server/tomcat-5.0.24/temp
Using JAVA_HOME: /usr

OK, that sounds like somebody telling me it recognizes some environment variables. Or something. In any case, it doesn't sound bad. But this does:

log4j:WARN No appenders could be found for logger (org.apache.catalina.startup.Embedded).
log4j:WARN Please initialize the log4j system properly.
log4j:WARN No appenders could be found for logger (org.apache.catalina.startup.TldConfig).
log4j:WARN Please initialize the log4j system properly.

Hmmm. And the terminal session is sitting there apparently hard at work, because I don't get the prompt back. Eventually I hit ^C and open that file the script was trying to open. Oooh, pretty. Now let's run that script again, because even though I know it won't be able to open that file, I've already got the file open, so that shouldn't matter.

Same messages. No joy. Eventually the web page times out. I am offcially dead in the water. Boo hoo.

[d~l]

does this help .. although not on MacOS?

http://www.laszlosystems.com/developers/community/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1143

[kokorozashi]

I see your point, but while those warning messages may be a red herring, the real problem is that it doesn't work. I'll launch the script again and see if anything encouraging shows up on the terminal overnight.

[kokorozashi]

Originally posted by kokorozashi
I'll launch the script again and see if anything encouraging shows up on the terminal overnight.

Nope.

[cliffspence]

I'm experiencing the same issue in my installation. Any luck so far?

[kokorozashi]

Afraid not, though of course I've given up for the nonce. I've had a private message from another person about this as well. Nice to know I'm not hallucinating. Still disappointed I can't make the beast run.

[ptw]

The Resourcerer issue sounds like it should be easy to fix, but it may not be Laslzo's fault. I'm not exactly sure what is going on there, but often tools like this will "helpfully" change application mappings. I have a similar issue where GoLive conveniently tells Mac OS that it is the app to launch for Real Audio files... I know the Mac install works, because I have installed and used it on a 'vanilla' Mac (i.e., not my development Mac), but obviously we cannot test it for compatibility with every other possible Mac program. If you have any ideas on how to address the Resourcerer issue, let us know.

A few other points:

Obviously the .command file is meant to open in the Terminal.

The Terminal session that it runs in has to stay open. We're working on a better way, but for now, it has to stay open. If you quit it, you will quit the Tomcat server and nothing will work.

As you have seen from the other threads, the log messages are innocuous. We have a fix for that that will be in the next release.

Finally, it just plain takes a long time for the Tomcat server to start (and fill its caches) on the Mac. Be patient. On my old Mac, it takes about 8 minutes to start. We should have a fix for this in the next release too, basically starting Tomcat without any pre-compiled apps, so your first response will be sooner, but each app you try will take longer. This is just a matter of choice between what you might like in a server environment vs. what you might like in a development environment.

If you are a savvy developer, you might be better off installing your own Tomcat and just taking the core distribution, but if you just want to see what it is all about, you should just be patient...

Hope this helps.

[kokorozashi]

As far as the Resorcerer issue goes, it's probably a remapping issue, but not the sort you expect. Resorcerer has not announced to Launch Services that Resorcerer is the authority of .command files. The problem seems to be that the files in question have a non-zero type and creator, which apparently overrrides filename extension in this case. When I set these values to zero (I used Super Get Info), the .command file opens in Terminal as expected. If you're interested in tracking down how these files got a non-zero type and creator, my guess is that Resorcerer "transmorgrified" these values at some point during development. Somebody started adding the custom icons with ResEdit or a tool which pretends to be ResEdit, but later switched to Resorcerer. Resorcerer has a preference, turned off by default if I remember correctly, which controls whether it will change files which have ResEdit's file type and creator to instead have Resorcerer's file type and creator. Otherwise, Resorcerer doesn't "helpfully" change anything related to the file, since it is after all a developer tool and assumes developers want to make all changes explicitly unless they say otherwise.

[ptw]

You are right that type/creator take precedence over file mapping. That is clearly the issue. I'll make sure it gets fixed in the next release.

[kokorozashi]

It took me a few minutes to write the previous response. When I finished, I noticed Laszlo Explorer seems to have opened in another browser window. I see clocks. Looks like all the other problems I reported earlier resulted from my attempts to overcome the Resorcerer issue; they were cascade effects. I don't have time to play right this very second, but if I am interpreting the results correctly, it seems anybody who has Resorcerer will not be able to launch Laszlo Explorer even if they attempt to work around the non-zero file type and creator values.

[yossie]

The next minor release of the LPS installer for the Mac will have the type and creator set correctly for the .command files so that they ALWAYS open Terminal. - Yossie Silverman