Building the Stand-alone Execution Environment

Before we can package our website we need to build a stand-alone execution environment containing the tools we use to maintain the website:

The directory structure of our stand-alone website development environment (most of which gets packaged into the setup wizard) consists of the following directories:

.                       Source and configuration files
./bin/aap/Exec          A-A-P Recipe Executive scripts
./bin/asciidoc          AsciiDoc scripts
./bin/python            Python execution environment
./install               Setup wizard and CD-ROM creation files
./artwork               Artwork source

To build this stand-alone website development environment observe the following steps:

Create a website development directory

Create an empty website development directory.

Important

IMPORTANT: The application and files referenced by the application must reside in a drive path (not a UNC path). This is because UNC paths do not have the functionality of drive paths. If necessary use Windows Explorer to map UNC paths to drive letters.

Copy example website

Copy all files and directories from the AsciiDoc distribution examples/website directory to your website development directory.

These example files serve as a starting point and include:

Create an Applications Sub-directory

Create a bin sub-directory and install AsciiDoc:

$ mkdir bin
Note

NOTE: Since we're creating a stand-alone execution environment you need to install the tools even if they are installed elsewhere on your PC.

Install AsciiDoc

Download the AsciiDoc zip file distribution from http://www.methods.co.nz/asciidoc/downloads.html and unzip to bin/asciidoc:

$ cd bin
$ mkdir asciidoc
$ cd asciidoc
$ unzip ~/asciidoc-2.1.zip

Install A-A-P Recipe Executive

Download the A-A-P Recipe Executive zip file distribution from http://www.a-a-p.org/ and unzip to bin/aap/Exec:

$ cd bin
$ mkdir aap
$ cd aap
$ mkdir Exec
$ cd Exec
Download the Aap Zip archive to the current directory.
$ unzip aap-1.234.zip

Create Python Execution Environment

We simply copy the required Python runtime files from the already installed Python environment. It is assumed that Python is installed development PC, if not you'll first need to download and install the Python Windows installer from http://www.python.org.

These notes relate to Python 2.2.2 for Windows, but should be applicable to other Python 2 Windows distributions.

Create a directory bin/python:

$ cd bin
$ mkdir python

Copy the following files and directories (including contents) from the installed Python22 program directory (normally in either C:\ or C:\Program Files) to bin/python:

python.exe
DLLs
include
Lib
libs

Copy python22.dll from the Windows System folder to our bin/python directory.

Note

NOTE: There's not need to copy the Lib/test folder or folders contained in the lib/site-packages/ folder unless you're sure they're used by your Python applications.

You now have a standalone execution environment, in fact there's almost certainly a lot of files in the bin/python directory that will never be used by your Python applications. In lieu of error prone application specific dependency checking I've opted for a brute force "better safe than sorry" approach. For example, console applications won't need the Lib/lib-tk' folder or the `tk83.dll or tcl83.dll files in the DLLs' folder and you almost certainly won't need the `Lib/distutils folder.

Execution environment directories

Running bin/python/python.exe will start your stand-alone Python execution environment. There's no need for registry entries or any files installed outside bin/python. When you start python.exe it automatically searches the directory in which it's installed for python22.dll and distribution sub-directories.