Setting-Up Bench

Install Bench from scratch and initialize the configuration

Setting up Bench means downloading and extracting the Bench system files, initializing the configuration, and setting up the required apps for Bench. The setup process is supported by a graphical initialization wizard.

Overview

A shortened version of this tutorial can be found in the Quickstart.

Prerequisites

The following conditions must be fulfilled to use Bench.

  • Microsoft Windows 7 or higher
  • Microsoft .NET 4.6.2
  • Internet access for HTTP/HTTPS (possibly via proxy, but without credentials)
  • A hard drive or a removable drive with at least 2 GB free memory
    (How much space Bench requires, depends on the apps you select.)
  • The Windows user account does not need admin privileges

Getting Bench

There are three ways to bootstrap the Bench setup process:

If you are not sure which way to go, use BenchSetup.exe.

Bench Setup Program

The preferred way to bootstrap the Bench setup, is to use the BenchSetup.exe .

  • Create a folder for Bench
  • Download BenchSetup.exe and save it anywhere you like
  • The most current browsers flag downloaded executable files, to inform Windows about the potentially untrusted origin of the downloaded file. Therefore, to allow the execution of the BenchSetup.exe, you have to open the property dialog for the downloaded file in the Windows Explorer and approve of the execution of the file.
  • Run BenchSetup.exe
  • Choose your created folder as the root directory for the new Bench environment
  • Follow the Initialization Wizard

If you run BenchSetup.exe on the command line, you can provide arguments, which will be passed to bench.exe transfer install after the extraction.

Batch Script

The predecessor of the setup program and still an alternative is the bench-install.bat.

  • Create a folder for Bench
  • Download bench-install.bat and save it inside the Bench folder
  • The most current browsers flag downloaded executable files, to inform Windows about the potentially untrusted origin of the downloaded file. Mozilla Firefox even adds the .txt filename extension to the batch file. Therefore, to allow the execution of the bench-install.bat, you have to do two things:
    • Remove the .txt extension, if it was added.
    • Open the property dialog for the downloaded file in the Windows Explorer and approve of the execution of the file.
  • Run bench-install.bat
  • Follow the Initialization Wizard

Manual Download

If you want to have full control over the setup process, you can always bootstrap the Bench setup process manually by downloading the Bench.zip and running the initialize action via the Bench CLI.

  • Download Bench.zip from https://github.com/winbench/bench/releases/latest
  • Create a folder for Bench
  • Extract the content of Bench.zip into the created folder
  • Optionally prepare the Bench environment with some customized files like
    • bench-site.md
    • config/config.md
    • config/app-activated.md
  • Run auto\bin\bench.exe -v initialize
  • Follow the Initialization Wizard

Initializing the Configuration

The setup of the Bench environment is guided by a graphical wizard.

Site Configuration

There are two groups of settings, which are usually set in the site configuration. Therefore, if the setup wizard can not find a bench-site.md in the Bench folder or its parents, it shows the following pages:

  • Proxy
    Optionally set a HTTP(S) proxy address.
  • User Identification
    Set the user name and email, which are set as environment variables and used e.g. in the Git configuration.

User Configuration

As next step the configuration folder is initialized. Therefore, if the setup wizard can not find the config\config.md file, it shows a page for the initialization of the configuration. There are two possibilities to initialize the configuration folder with the initialization wizard:

  • Initialize a standard configuration
  • Checkout an existing configuration from a Git URL

If the standard configuration was chosen, some basic options can be set on the next pages, before the setup process starts.

  • The isolation settings allow to choose between a fully isolated Bench environment and a more comfortable integration into the Windows user profile.
  • The app/group selection allows to preselect some apps or app groups, respectively, which will be setup right away.

Advanced Settings

The last page of the setup wizard shows some additional settings for the setup process. Currently you can decide if the Bench Dashboard is started immediately with the setup action after setting up Bench.

Setting Up Required Apps

After stepping through the initialization wizard, the required apps for the Bench system are downloaded and installed. This initial app setup is performed in a standard Windows console window.

When finished installing the required apps, the Bench Dashboard is started. In case it was activated in the initialization wizard, the setup window of the Bench Dashboard is opened immediately, and all additionally activated apps from the configuration are installed.

Next

Now you can select and install your desired apps.

See Also

Tech Guides

Reference Docs