Jtdcftul

Using the install script for packet tracer from here backs up the data in my home directory for some reason, before the install starts. Does anyone know why? Here's the script - paste.ubuntu.com/10975482/

Update: here are some new outputs from the terminal

Installing into /home/eric/pt
cp: cannot stat ‘./Downloads/Windows10_InsiderPreview_x64_EN-US_10074(1).iso.part’: No such file or directory
cp: cannot copy a directory, ‘./pt’, into itself, ‘/home/eric/pt/pt’


I told it to install to `/home/username/pt
It took my home contents and copied them into that location... why?

It didn't even install. The packettracer file is empty

Update: 'Installed' using This guide

sudo sh PacketTracer533_i386_installer-deb.bin

sudo ./PacketTracer533_i386_installer-deb.bin

But I cannot launch, as the command packettracer closes without any error messages, as does packettracer --help and packettracer -h
Update: installing libgtk2.0-0:i386 fixed the GUI launch, but not the terminal one.

if [ -e $IDIR ]; then

    read -p "It appears that Packet Tracer is already installed.  Do you wish to replace it? [Yn] " NEEDREPLACE

    if [ "$NEEDREPLACE" = "y" ] || [ "$NEEDREPLACE" = "Y" ] || [ -z $NEEDREPLACE ]; then

        sudo rm -rf $IDIR

    else

        echo "Program Terminated"; exit 0

    fi

fi

That rm spells trouble... if you install the software in / your system is gone, if you install it in /home/$USER/ you /home/$USER/ is gone. Reason? There is NO sanity check here:

echo "You have accepted the terms to the EULA. Congratulations. Packet Tracer will now be installed."

    read -p "Enter location to install Cisco Packet Tracer or press enter for default [/opt/pt]: " IDIR



if [ -z $IDIR ]; then

    IDIR="/opt/pt"

fi

IDIR should always add /pt to the input if the user does not insert it themself. They did that for the default, they did not do that for user input. Very very bad.

Now from here all things end up in a mess. The reason you see you home being copied is because you did not add the /pt/ part in the input and those idiots did not add it themself.

if mkdir $IDIR > /dev/null 2>&1; then

    if cp -r $SDIR/* $IDIR; then

        echo Copied all files successfully to $IDIR

    fi

Here they copy SDIR to IDIR. SDIR is defined as

DIR=`dirname $_`

dirname: "will retrieve the directory-path name from a pathname ignoring any trailing slashes". That means the current dir and then 1 up. So they assume here you inserted /home/$USER/pt/ and then want to make a copy of that. Again they forgot to check if what is happening here is sane: this spells trouble since it goes 1 directory back and copies that over. Bad.

All should be OK if you pick the default (/opt/pt/). Mind that the FHS states 3rd party software should be installed in /opt/ and if you stick to that it'll go as intended. But the creator of this should receive a warning: this is a badly written script.

The script shouldn't be run from your home folder. It should be run from a folder containing only the packettracer assets.

See

SDIR=`dirname $_`

...

cp -r $SDIR $IDIR

And, I'm totally not installing a binary deb from mediafire. Can't help you with that part.

I extracted the contents to a folder, then changed my pwd to that folder. I ran the install script by typing ./install at the prompt and it copied only the contents within the pt folder. It did not copy my Desktop or Home Directory contents.
Reboot computer and type packettracer from a command line. Done!