GPL Ghostscript 9.00 and 8.71 can't be installed on my Windows XP PC. After executing gs900w32.exe an Report pops up saying that "<path>\gs900w32.exe ist not a permitted Win32-application. The only Button in the report is "O. K.". Pressing it terminates the execution of the exe-file. The same happens when executing gs871w32.exe but not when executing gs864w32.exe which I installed an uninstalled several times. Im using a PC with intel Centrino processor and Microsoft Windows XP Professional Version 2002 Service Pack 3 (32 bit) OS. The Problem existed even befor any Ghostscript has ever been installed and remained also while GPL Ghostscript 8.64 (gs864w32.exe) was installed and after it was removed.
I don't, unfortunately, have a copy of XP to try this with but I did try with both Windows 2000 and Windows Vista. I downloaded the release binaries directly from the Ghostscript releases site: http://ghostscript.com/releases/ gs871w32.exe - 16,357,376 bytes MD5 hash: c815b2079e5aa322f517fcbac3036552 SHA1 hash: 65b35e7a5d5bfb589eac163a31bf80108a1e5853 gs900w32.exe - 15,217,152 bytes MD5 hash: 1c7f419eb33af46b906fc1d0985dcd48 SHA1 hash: e423f840d5ffbd1f9e229b728f780b056f98c388 I used a standard user (not Administrator or a user with admin rights) and was able to install quite happily using these binaries. The self-extraction even works on Windows 95, though setupgs.exe then fails. The most likely explanation is corrupted binaries I think. You might try getting fresh copies from the location above. Also you can compute the SHA1 and MD5 hashes and compare them with the values above. You can pick up the Microsoft 'File Checksum Integrity Verifier; from here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/841290 if you don't already have a means of computing the hashes. The only other possibility I can think of off-hand would be some kind of permissions problem, you might try running the setup application as Administrator or a user with admin rights. Does the self-extractor run before you get the Windows error message ? It sounds like it doesn't, but its not absolutely clear.
I now have downloaded gs900w32.exe from http://ghostscript.com/releases/ . With this file, installation was possibe without any problem, so it really may have been a corrupted binary. I downloaded the files wich caused the problem from http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/doc/GPL/gpl900.htm (gs900w32.exe) and http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/doc/GPL/gpl871.htm (gs871w32.exe). Maybe these files aren't O. K. At all attemts to install Ghostscript I was using an accout with admin rights. @ Ken Sharp: The Windows error message appeared immediately after I confimed that I want to execute the gs900w32.exe file respectively the gs871w32.exe file. This means: I dobleclick the gs900w32.exe file in the Download folder, then a Warning message apperars that tells me, that this file is an executabe file an ask if I want to execute it. When I klick "execute", immediately afterwards the Windows error message "<path>\gs900w32.exe ist not a permitted Win32-application" appears. So it appears before the extractor-message-window could open.
(In reply to comment #2) > I now have downloaded gs900w32.exe from http://ghostscript.com/releases/ . With > this file, installation was possibe without any problem, so it really may have > been a corrupted binary. I downloaded the files wich caused the problem from > http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/doc/GPL/gpl900.htm (gs900w32.exe) and > http://pages.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost/doc/GPL/gpl871.htm (gs871w32.exe). Maybe these > files aren't O. K. The 9.00 release on that site is only 5.1 MB, so its much too small, it also doesn't run for me, so its clearly been broken. The 8.71 release isn't there any more so I can't tell about that one, I assume the same problem existed. I'll look into getting someone to fix the broken executable at wisc.edu.
Looking here: http://mirror.cs.wisc.edu/pub/mirrors/ghost/GPL/gs900/ gs900w32.exe is listed as being 15Mb which is the same size as ghostscript.com, and for me it downloads slightly over 14.5Mb. I don't have Windows running just now, so I can't try the exe, but the size of the download looks okay to me.
(In reply to comment #4) > Looking here: > http://mirror.cs.wisc.edu/pub/mirrors/ghost/GPL/gs900/ > > gs900w32.exe is listed as being 15Mb which is the same size as ghostscript.com, > and for me it downloads slightly over 14.5Mb. I don't have Windows running just > now, so I can't try the exe, but the size of the download looks okay to me. Hmm tried it again, same site, same instance of Firefox. This time I got a 15MB download, and it works correctly. Looks like the wisc.edu site is just flaky. Since it does work (more or less) I'm closing as works for me.