Re: The leanest, meanest Windows installer possible

On 7/28/07, Mitchell Vincent <ksoftware(at)gmail(dot)com> wrote:
> Hi all. I'm looking at distributing PostgreSQL with a desktop
> application and have a couple of what might be simple questions.
>
> I've been using PG for years and years but bringing it to the Win32
> desktop presents some deployment challenges. Since this software will
> be downloaded I am looking for the smallest possible installer that
> provides the functionality I'm looking for. Currently the whole
> application (including the SQLite library that it's using now) is only
> about 4 megs. The 20+ meg installer is awesome in it's functionality
> but I won't be using most of what is contained in it (docs, language
> drivers, etc). Is there a smaller "bare essentials" MSI installer that
> provides an easy interface for setting things like the admin password
> and the non-privileged service user addition but that contains only
> the required EXEs and DLLs? Or perhaps a way for me to take the MSI
> installer and strip out the things I won't be needing?

Well, it's possible to install postgresql on windows using only a
batch file, plus a couple of small utilities like 'ntrights.exe' and
possibly 'sanur.exe' to do some things which are difficult from the
command prompt. You can use the built in net command to do user
management and pg_ctl.exe can handle creation of the service and
bootstrap the database yourself with runas/initdb.exe. This would add
a few kb to the required files which are the in the lib, bin, and
share folders iirc.

Also, if you don't have any ssl requirements you can recompile the
database without ssl...ditto contrib. This is a medium difficulty
exercise and you have to test with all versions of windows you plan to
deploy on (watch out for things like password policies, etc).

Also remember you can run the standard installer in silent mode. I
think in the long run this is probably a better idea than what you are
thinking about doing...

merlin