The discussion about the workflow of installing a new application has been revived.
I agree with the problems raised with dmg’s, specially with the need to unmount them. But with a zipped app, there is no way of instructing the user to move it to the correct place. I like the idea of suggesting the user to move the application to the right place, but I disagree with Andy Kim in two points:
First I would like to choose the place where I want to install the application. I don’t really use /Applications but ~/Applications instead (so apps don’t have root access) and I organize my apps in folders (Dev, Creative, Utils, etc…). I don’t think everyone should do this, but they should have the possibility of having their own organization.
Second, the dialog should be brought up when a new app is downloaded (using FSEvents or something similar) instead on the first time it’s opened. This has the advantage of having applications always in the right place and it’s easier to catalog the application if I do it right after the download, and not after some time when I’m checking the contents of the download folder.
Anyway, Apple should suggest a standard (and correct) way of doing this, and maybe allowing the possibility of extending the process with some scripts (for serial keys, EULAs, some shell-fu, etc..).