windows-server-2003/printscan/print/spooler/inetsrv/design.txt

GENERATE SELF-EXTRACTING EXECUTABLE
-----------------------------------

This directory contains the files necessary for performing the generation
of the self-extracting-executable.  The main entry-point is GenerateCAB(),
which in turn manipulates INF and CDF objects,

    gencab - CAB control module.
    geninf - INF object methods.
    gencdf - CDF object methods.

This design has seperated responsibilities of the various components into
object-type modules.  For example, anything which has to do with an INF-file
is handled in the (geninf.c/geninf.h) modules.  Likewise, the CDF routines
use an INF interface to obtain information concerning the INF.  Previous
implementations of which this code was derived, utilized a monolithic approach
where the CDF, INF and CAB routines had integral knowledge of each others
functionality.

We diverged from this approach to a more object-oriented design which we
believe is more maintainable and somewhat self-documenting.


    Structure/Flow:

        cab:

        if (Create INF Object) {

            if (Create CDF Object) {

                query CDF, INF objects for pertinent information.

                if (CDF newer than CAB) {

                    Execute IExpress to generate new cab.

                } else {

                    utilize cached cabname.
                }

                Free CDF Object.
            }

            Free INF Object.
        }

        return cabname.




Issues:
-------

1) How do we determine op-sys versioning and archetecture?  We need this
   to determine where to pull our INF driver-files.  This should be passed
   in at GenerateCAB() time.

2) Generating an INF (to be or not to be)...although not huge, this could
   change our implementating of caching of the CDF/CAB files.  Currently,
   we will generate a layout-file (sort of).