Windows installation without admin rights

[mardukbp]

The Windows installer requires Admin rights, but AFAIK LiveView is installed in the user's AppData directory. The problem is Admin rights are usually not available in an enterprise environment. Python, Java and .NET can be installed without admin rights (which leads to them being used in enterprises instead of Elixir).

Why can't Elixir be installed without Admin rights? I know Erlang also needs Admin rights, so maybe that's why. But is there a fundamental reason? It would be great to be able to download a .zip file, configure one or two environment variables and use Elixir :)

PS: Chocolatey is not a solution. Yes it can be installed without admin rights, but that requires executing a PowerShell script while circumventing the security policies. That is a no-go in an enterprise environment.

EDIT: I just checked the installer file and learned that admin rights are needed for registering the livebook protocol and also livebook as handler for .livemd files. IMO this can be optional. The Python installer makes it optional to use admin rights.

The Python installer is built using WiXToolset.

[mardukbp]

I did some research and found NsisMultiUser, an NSIS plugin that allows selecting the installation mode:

[mardukbp]

I got it working! Here's how I did it.

1. Following rel/app/windows/run.sh I edited Installer.nsi to create HKCU registry entries:

Section "Install Handlers"
  DetailPrint "Registering .livemd File Handler"
  DeleteRegKey HKCU "Software\Classes\.livemd"
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\.livemd" "" "Livebook.LiveMarkdown"
  DeleteRegKey HKCU "Software\Classes\Livebook.LiveMarkdown"
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\Livebook.LiveMarkdown" "" "LiveMarkdown"
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\Livebook.LiveMarkdown\DefaultIcon" "" "$INSTDIR\Livebook.exe,1"
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\Livebook.LiveMarkdown\shell\open\command" "" '"$INSTDIR\Livebook.exe" "open:%1"'

  DetailPrint "Registering livebook URL Handler"
  DeleteRegKey HKCU "Software\Classes\livebook"
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\livebook" "" "Livebook URL Protocol"
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\livebook" "URL Protocol" ""
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\livebook\shell" "" ""
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\livebook\shell\open" "" ""
  WriteRegStr  HKCU "Software\Classes\livebook\shell\open\command" "" '"$INSTDIR\Livebook.exe" "open:%1"'
SectionEnd

Section "Uninstall"
  DeleteRegKey HKCU "Software\Classes\.livemd"
  DeleteRegKey HKCU "Software\Classes\Livebook.LiveMarkdown"
  DeleteRegKey HKCU "Software\Classes\livebook"
  DeleteRegKey HKLM "Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\Livebook"
  DeleteRegKey HKLM "Software\Dashbit\Livebook"
  DeleteRegKey /ifempty HKLM "Software\Dashbit"

Now admin rights are not needed:

RequestExecutionLevel user

I tested the file association for .livemd files and it works.

2. I built the installer and executed it as a user with no admin rights. The first thing the installer does is execute vc_redist.x64.exe, which does need admin rights. So that installer failed. But that was not a problem, because the DLLs provided by that installer were already installed. My suggestion would be to make executing this installer optional (with the notice that it requires admin rights). I have seen exactly this option in other installers.

3. I launched Livebook, created a notebook, evaluated 1 + 1 and... it failed with "Failed to connect runtime - Elixir terminated unexpectedly". After some searching and experimentation I found the solution. Which means that I edited the following lines in %LOCALAPPDATA%\rel\releases\0.13.0-dev\env.bat:

- if not defined RELEASE_DISTRIBUTION set RELEASE_DISTRIBUTION=sname
+ if not defined RELEASE_DISTRIBUTION set RELEASE_DISTRIBUTION=name

- if not defined RELEASE_NODE set RELEASE_NODE=livebook-app-!TIMESTAMP:~8,6!-!RANDOM!
+ if not defined RELEASE_NODE set RELEASE_NODE=livebook-app-!TIMESTAMP:~8,[email protected]

4. I restarted Livebook and I could finally execute a code cell!

5. But the real goal was to use Elixir for a project. So I executed iex.bat and I got the error: "Could not load module C:\Program Files\Erlang OTP\erts-14.2.5\bin\erlexec.dll". After some searching I learned that this path is configured in %LOCALAPPDATA%\rel\vendor\otp\bin\erl.ini. I edited this file so that it contains:

[erlang]
Bindir=C:\\Users\\MyUser\\AppData\\Local\\Livebook\\rel\\vendor\\otp\\erts-14.2.5\\bin
Progname=erl
Rootdir=C:\\Users\\MyUser\\AppData\\Local\\Livebook\\rel\\vendor\\otp

And the rest is history! I ended up installing Phoenix and ElixirLS and executing the initial Phoenix project.

Bottom line

Livebook (and Elixir) can be installed (and used) on Windows without admin rights.
This requires modifications to three files:

• rel/app/env.bat.eex
• rel/app/windows/Installer.nsi
• %LOCALAPPDATA%\rel\vendor\otp\bin\erl.ini (after the installation)

Assuming vc_redist.x64.exe is superfluous, the installation works (as far as I can see).

The question is why is vc_redist needed? Because of Windows Forms?

[mardukbp]

I reimplemented Livebook without Windows Forms, using native Windows APIs and two awesome libraries:

• H.NotifyIcon
• TextCopy

I tested all items in the context menu of the tray icon. They work as expected. Also the error handling with the messagebox works.

Livebook now targets .NET 8, which is the latest LTS release and depends on the Universal C Runtime (ucrt) that is part of Windows 10. So now vc_redist.x64.exe is not needed.

@wojtekmach I uploaded all the changes to the branch windows-installer-no-admin. Let me know if I should submit a PR.

[wojtekmach]

I believe we needed vc_redist for OTP to work. In any case, please send a PR and I’ll test it. Thank you for looking into it!

[mardukbp]

Thank you, I did not know that. I did some research and learned that erl.exe is dynamically linked to vcruntime140.dll. This library is shipped with Python, VS Code and many other packages. I think it should be possible to add it to OTP after extracting it.

I just created the PR.