[Thuban-list] running Thuban as a portable GIS viewer

[Bernhard Reiter]

Hi Tim,

On Friday 23 May 2008 22:25, Tim Michelsen wrote:
> so far, I have only used Thuban as a GIS viewer installed on the
> specific operating system:
> On windows this has been installed with setup.exe install file and on
> linux as a package (*.deb).
>
> In the README it says:
>
> To setup Thuban to run directly from the source directory:
>
>     python setup.py install_local
>
> My question here is:
>
> Is it possible to build Thuban in the above stated way and then put it
> on a USB drive or CD-R and execute it from there?

The ability to put Thuban on a media an run it from there is independent
from the "install_local" feature. This feature is only a comfort function
to copy the Thuban files to the system location where it usually would reside
in a GNU/Linux system. "install_local" allows you to run Thuban directly in 
place.

Of course you can produce a self-contain media running Thuban.
(My company Intevation has done this a few years ago.)
You need to put everything on that you need to run Thuban.

There are two general ways:
a) Complete operating system and Thuban. Works e.g. GNU/Linux
   like a kanotix or morphix live-CDs. Needs all Thuban packages installed.
   Putting it in will boot it.

b) Only the Thuban application (with all dependencies) e.g. ready to run
   for several operating system like Windows, GNU/Linux.

> What I am looking for is a "portable" (in the sense of moving arround)
> GIS viewer that I can use to deliver results of my work to reviewers,
> collegues or clients who are not GIS specialists, who may not have GIS
> systems installed or just want to view the results of the work.

It is possible to do this with Thuban.

> I know that it needs some other packages as stated in the requirements
> such as the Python environment and a few libraries.
>
> But I could use Portable Python (http://www.portablepython.com/) to
> provide that on the CD-R and use a startup script.

I do not have experience with portablepython, so I can only guess.
My guess is that you at least need the wxWidget and other binary libraries, 
but you can make it work. I cannot say how difficult it is, though, without 
having tried myself.

> Would a Thuban installation configured in such a way run from any PC
> (Linux or Windows) without problems or further dependencies?

GNU/Linux and Windows would need binary libraries for their specific variants
(e.g. Debian Etch, Ubuntu, RedHat, XP, Vista).
Thuban needs those libraries and they are not pure python.

> Can I then specify a defaukt session in my startup script that
> automatically starts the programm with my layers?

Yes.

> P.S.: I put this mailing list up on Gmane. I hope that you like that...

I am not using Gmame myself, I have nothing against spreading knowledge 
about this public list. :)

Best,
Bernhard


-- 
Managing Director - Owner: www.intevation.net       (Free Software Company)
Germany Coordinator: fsfeurope.org. Coordinator: www.Kolab-Konsortium.com.
Intevation GmbH, Osnabrück, DE; Amtsgericht Osnabrück, HRB 18998
Geschäftsführer Frank Koormann, Bernhard Reiter, Dr. Jan-Oliver Wagner
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