Marine Aquarium 3.1 Unofficial Installer
 

To facilitate installation of Marine Aquarium 3.1 (and to prevent the antivirus problems of posting an SCR file), I have packaged Marine Aquarium 3.1 in a self-extracting RAR file. By default, the Aquarium will install into %SYSTEMROOT%\system32\ and will try to set itself as the default screen saver (and display the Preview screen).

Download Marine Aquarium 3.1

The installer will prompt you to replace your existing MarineAquarium3.scr screen saver with the new one. If you wish to, click Yes.


I know this will not work on every system, but this will handle most situations for the coming days/weeks until SereneScreen.com has been updated with 3.1. This package is designed for users who already have Marine Aquarium 3 installed.

This installer was created by me and is NOT a product of SereneScreen, Jim Sachs, or Prolific Publishing. We are not responsible for any problems which may occur as a result of using this installer.

Thanks, Morgan - that was very nice of you! :)

Installed
 

Installed on my Dell(XP) with no problems:)

Installed!
 

Installed smoothly on my laptop! I had to remove the shortcut to the old version, though. I replaced the old version with the new version, but even then the shortcut launched the old version... All solved now. Now I can update my other computers. I also installed MA3 on the computer that runs my home domotics, it now runs on the touchscreen built into the wall. Beautiful!

...On second thought, it seems something does not work as expected. Windows still launches the old version as screensaver, even when I right click the new version and select "install'...

engelens - You did not mention which version of Windows you are using. Morgan's installer puts Marine Aquarium in the proper place for the majority of users, but if your version of Windows expects screensavers to be somewhere else, then it will find and launch the old one. Perhaps you could do a Search for the program, and delete all previous copies.

Also, this installer doesn't create a shortcut. It writes MarineAquarium3.scr to %systemroot%\system32\ so for most people, their existing shortcut will work.

If I thought MA3.1 was weeks away from being released on SereneScreen.com, I'd do a more advanced installer.

Ok, I found it in the system32 folder and replaced it with the new version. It now seems to work. The mistake I made was to change the installation folder you indicated and create a shortcut towards the extracted file (I use it as a programme as wel as a screensaver) :) The shortcut launched the new version, but the old version was still in the system32 folder. I use XP, by the way. (At work, I run it on my mac at home :)

For the record, this new installer is working with Win2kPro, as intended. - It auto-replaced Beta10d in the WINNT\system32\ folder with v3.1, and the existing desktop icon for MA3 (Beta10d), now loads MA3.1 - Also, Windows launches MA3.1 after the allotted time, as the default screen saver.

No problems....100% success!....

Good old Win2k - the last of the straightforward operating systems :)

Although it goes End-of-Life on the 13th...

http://support.microsoft.com/lifecyc...a=windows+2000

John

There's a quote about cold dead fingers. ;)


Remember when we only had 2 choices for installers?

InstallShield -- A lumbering dinosaur lacking grace and agility. Typically added 8-10MB of data to any installer. Often requiring brain surgery to uninstall.

Microsoft Installer (MSI) -- a systemwide installer system that, if it fails, prevents installation of any program requiring it. Countless tech support hours have been spent trying to remove, update, or otherwise make MSI do something useful.

Fortunately there are many installer builders now, and most are very space efficient and just plain work. Nullsoft (makes of Winamp) wrote their own installer. I've used AGInstaller by Agentix and it was pretty cool. Both of them only add about 250kb to the download package. AGInstaller could be fully scripted to run a batch file or executable as well as verify certain conditions and read system variables.

No problems with my Windows XP laptop. There were some things to clean up from my own 'installation' which wouldn't be of relevanve for someone just updating from 3 to 3.1.

This installer does not work on 64-bit Windows versions. It will try to install in c:\Windows\system32 but instead the OS redirects the installation to c:\Windows\SysWOW64. Paradoxically system32 is only accessible to 64-bit programs. 32-bit programs, such as Morgan's installer, are redirected to SysWOW64.

The installer will seem to work initially because when it sets MA as default screensaver it uses MA 3.1 which it installed in c:\Windows\SysWOW64. However, when you set another screensaver as default and then try to pick MA again it will revert back to the old 3.0 version which is still in c:\Windows\system32.

The start menu shortcut also points to this old 3.0 version.

A workaround for 32-bit installers on 64-bit Windows is to install in c:\Windows\Sysnative\. This will redirect the installation to the true c:\Windows\system32\ folder. Leave it to Microsoft to think up something as crazy as this. :rolleyes:


My advice for 64-bit Windows users is to wait for the SereneScreen installer.

If you already used this installer on 64-bit Windows you need to move c:\Windows\SysWOW64\MarineAquarium3.scr to c:\Windows\system32\MarineAquarium3.scr and overwrite the old version. (use Windows Explorer to do this because if you use a 3rd party file manager which happens to be a 32-bit application it will run into the same redirection problems as the installer)

I could make an installer that puts the file into the folder you've suggested. Sysnative. LOL

That would not work with Windows XP. I forgot to mention that the Sysnative alias is only present in Windows Vista and 7. :o

2 downloads.

Nice to see you back, Mountainmaster!

And is it just me who feels that the people in charge of MS project development strategy need to have their heads knocked together?

Windows Vista/7 should have been a from-the-ground up project. Just make it a clean break from XP and make a truly awesome, innovative OS. Let XP apps run in a window. It worked for Mac OS X and hell, it's built into Windows 7 ANYWAY.

Instead we have crap grafted onto crap. 20 years of legacy code.

Or you could use "standard" UNIX, 40 years of legacy code, and.....

Does anyone use standard UNIX?

IS there a 'standard' Unix? Oh wait, maybe I'm thinking of Linux. Sorry, GNU/Linux.

A long time ago when I was working in a bookstore a guy came in looking for The UNIX Bible, only the lady I was working with thought he said The Eunochs Bible. The look on his face was priceless.

Wikipedia says Mac OS X is based on UNIX. You learn something every day...

Mac OS X is based on FreeBSD.

FreeBSD is a free Unix-like operating system descended from AT&T UNIX via the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD). FreeBSD's development began in 1993. It is completely free of any UNIX-sourced code and has been for many years.

Mac OS X is based upon the Mach kernel.[11] Certain parts from FreeBSD's and NetBSD's implementation of Unix were incorporated in Nextstep, the core of Mac OS X. Nextstep was the object-oriented operating system developed by Steve Jobs' company NeXT after he left Apple in 1985.

I used to like v6 "small" unix :-)
Real unix is the Bell Labs version... which has had a long and exciting history...
I still think it was excellent back in the day and not as hot as people like to think these days... user/group/world and "everything's a file" indeed!

Just tried this on my Windows7 Premium machine. Left everything in the installer at default and it went in perfectly, putting the screensaver file in SysWow64. Now I know why I don't use this machine much. Working with Windows7 is only slightly less painful than a root canal. Took me forever to set up a desktop shortcut, something I could do in XP in less than a minute.

I don't understand why your experience was different from:

Me either. 3.0 was removed from my machine. I don't think we actually know which 64 bit windows OS Mountainmaster is using.

You're right - it might be Vista. However (in theory) that shouldn't be different.

Or perhaps Morgan has updated the installer? Did you do a fresh download of the installer?

I'm presuming (?) that you had originally used the Prolific installer version to put 3.0 on this machine, and that it worked correctly.

At any rate, testing Morgan's installer presumably isn't a purpose of this forum. I was just curious.

It could be Vista or Wndows7 Ultimate.

Yes, I freshly downloaded the 3.1 installer version this morning and yes I did have the Prolific version of 3.0.

Edgar should be back from vacation soon to make the official installer.

If I do post a 64-bit installer, it will be a secondary download.

I use 64-bit Windows 7 Home Premium.

Perhaps the Prolific installer did not have 64-bit support in an early version. Lack of 64-bit support would make it behave the same as Morgan's installer. When I installed 3.0 I had a relatively recent download of Prolific's installer (November 20, 2009).

Anyway, if 3.0 is not always in the same location on a 64-bit Windows machine the new Prolific 3.1 installer had better be smart. :erm:

Any word when Edgar will update to version 3.1 on the SereneScreen website? I have Win7 Pro 64-bit. I can't wait to get the day/night feature back. I've missed it since upgrading from 2.6.

The day/night feature?

I imagine Steam Noodle means the segue from light colours to dark in the background which is now possible.

Ah! .... Steamed dumpling, you mean. - Had me confused there, for one minute....

Cliff - that would be Dampfknödel. :) I use my spe-cial-ist knowledge of Germans to bring you this tidbit. ;D

And it should be noted by the world at large, that none of this has anything to do with steamboats. Just in case anyone thought it might! :TU:

Edit - let's see if hyphenating a word takes out the ****** asterisks!

...... So that must mean that 'tidbit' is the spe******t knowledge German word for titbit? ....

spe******t ???...... :erm: :loco:



Edit: - Mark, - I've just done a little Googleing and discovered what c-i-a-l-i-s, (or what this forum likes to call ******), is. :eek: - From now on you will have to be called.... An authority, or An expert.... :)

Anyway... I'm still confused about what dampfnudel expects from Edgar that isn't already available.

I'm guessing he/she is after an installer that works with Win7 Pro 64-bit ?
.... He/she could of course read on from Mountainmaster's post #13....

Maybe he means automatic lights?