It’s all very intuitive if you actually put a symlink to the applications folder and include some text rather than trying to do everything via images.

If it needs any other components, just deal with it.

Let’s walk through a typical windows install:
- Welcome to the installer, click next (well, duh. oh really, was I installing something?)
- Choose installation location (does this matter? This is basically preset on most platforms – figure it out. If I change it, its more work for me, and something’s probably going to break, anyway)
- Choose components (fair enough, I guess… save space for bloatware on small hard drives… but seriously, just add a higher hdd space requirement)
- Do some other product configuration (can’t I do this in Tools->Options after install?)
- Wait for actual install to happen (why didn’t it just skip to this step in the first place).
- Installation complete, click finish

Its just ridiculous.

I have to say Mac is much easier… but the drag-drop to applications is a bit unintuitive the first time. Instead of the program icon with a picture of an arrow pointing to applications, why not have a button saying “Install this application”… or make the picture of ths applications folder an actual shortcut to it. Still, this is a better user experience than a typical windows installer.

Linux apps are quite nice when package management is available… but when you have to compile… I’m sorry – what? Compile? And the ./install or ./configure, make crap is stupid – why can’t I run it from an icon? Whenever I have to install a linux app this way, my success rate is about 1 in 10. This is an INSTALLER, people… i’m not trying to do anything difficult. I shouldn’t really need to know anything about how to install the software – that’s the installer’s job!