[Brad]

Originally Posted by Luky

But that is different, you can just download and install the files from here without accually marking it as installed where as on your computer, you cannot use the application without running the installer unless you wish to waste your time and unpack it then install it manually, which is just stupid.

It is the same..unless the application you downloaded is reporting back to another server. In other words when you install "Joe's screensaver manager" it doesn't tell Joe you installed it and even if it tried to you could always yank the cable from your computer to prevent it from doing so (unless he's evil an requires and internet connection before allowing you to use it). Aside from that you missed the point....

Anyway who cares if I click install or not? That's my business not yours. For example why should I install my own modifications? I don't need to know about updates and I don't care to have them crowding my list in the usercp. The only reason I do click install for my own modifications is so I can make sure the update e-mails get sent when I do send them.

What I'm saying is this basically; Anyone that needs the features that the install button provides is going to click it anyway. So why bother with forcing the rest of us to click uninstall all of the time just so a few people get a better user title?

Yeah, download != install. However, install == install. And a callhome would handle updating 'installed' on both install and uninstall. It would work very much like the already exiting version check and product urls.

I'll tell you why a call home doesn't work and why the old staff decided not to allow it. We thought it was a nice idea to be honest but people were abusing it. I won't name names but many people where using it in a way that would click install upon installation but not click un-install upon de-installtion. We felt using a call home in that manner was in bad taste.

Also, we had a few complaints from people installing modifications on their test forums. They were not pleased to see certain modifications appering in their usercp 'out of no where'. It was causing us problems....so we fixed the problem.

It could work in a perfect world don't get me wrong. There are just too many ways for it to be abused and few bad apples ruined it for everyone. IMO it would be fine as long as hack author's don't have to add it themselves to the install/uninstall code for products. vBulletin should handle such things and do the needed work based on the productid. Such changes would require a lot of work for the staff here and the developers though. I don't really see the pay off in doing all that work when again, anyone that needs to click the install button is already doing so already.

There will always be ways for people to 'rob you of your install count' so I honestly don't see the point in worrying about it. You should just be happy with learning new things and having other people enjoy your work.