Windows Installer 3.0

Posted September 24, 2004

Chat Date: September 23, 2004

Please note: Portions of this transcript have been edited for clarity

Introduction

Moderator: Andy (Microsoft)
Welcome to today's chat. Our topic is Windows Installer 3.0. Questions, comments, and suggestions are welcome.

Moderator: Andy (Microsoft)
I'll now have the hosts introduce themselves.

Host: KenWong (Microsoft)
Hi my name is Ken and I am a tester on the Windows Installer Team.

Host: asharma (Microsoft)
Hello! I'm Ashish, a tester on the Windows Installer team.

Host: Hem (Microsoft)
Hi, I am Hemchander. I am developer at the Windows Installer team.

Host: Chris (Microsoft)
Howdy! My name is Chris Gouge. I was a senior developer on the MSI team until just recently and am filling in for the lovely and talented Carolyn today.

Host: Tyler (Microsoft)
My name is Tyler Robinson. I am the Program Manager for the Windows Installer here at Microsoft. I look forward to talking with you today.

Host: OmSharma (Microsoft)
Hi - I am Om from the Windows Installer Program Management team

Moderator: Andy (Microsoft)
And I'm Andy Q, Communities producer

Start of Chat

Host: OmSharma (Microsoft)
Q: stern67 : Can I get Windows Installer 3.0 without SP2 for Win XP?
A: Windows Installer v3.0 has been released with XPSP2. The redistributable release for Win2k/SP3, Win2k/SP4, WinXP, WinXP/SP1 and Windows Server2003 is under development.

Host: Tyler (Microsoft)
Additionally, the Windows Installer 3.0 SDK is available as part of the Windows XP Service Pack 2 SDK at https://www.microsoft.com/msdownload/platformsdk/sdkupdate/

Host: Tyler (Microsoft)
Q: when will the MSI 3 redistributable be released?
A: We do not yet have a release date for the Windows Installer 3.0 redistributable.

Host: Tyler (Microsoft)
Q: any approximate release time frame? Is it a matter of days, weeks, months...?
A: We are working hard on the redistributable, but we do not have a timeframe to communicate at this point.

Host: Hem (Microsoft)
Q: Are there any plans for a MSI authoring tool (other than Orca) from MS? something similar to Wise?
A: Visual Studio helps you build MSI packages. WIX (Windows Installer XML) toolset is an open source toolset useful in authoring MSI packages. It is widely used within Microsoft. Here's where you will find information about it: https://sourceforge.net/projects/wix.

Host: asharma (Microsoft)
Q: Is there a mechanism to disable the installer from interacting with COM calls? Even temporarily?
A: No. But you can avoid this by using Registry table to register COM components.

Moderator: Andy (Microsoft)
For those new to the chat - Our topic is Windows Installer 3.0. We're about halfway in-keep those questions coming!

Host: Chris (Microsoft)
Q: Generally Windows installer applications will not allow a second installation of the same application. If you want to test a new release while keeping an old on you have to go to a different machine. Is this something that the user has any control over?
A: It depends on what you mean by "new release" if this is a new release with a different ProductCode, then you should be able to install it alongside your existing release from the MSI point of view (how well the app itself handles this depends on your implementation of the product.) If this is a minor release that you are packaging as a new MSI file rather than as an MSP (MSPs are recommended for smaller updates) then you would not be able to install alongside the current software, you would need to upgrade the existing instance using the recache-reinstall flags as described in the documentation. This is what your customers would need to do as well, so it is a good thing to test. For clean installs in this case, you would need to go to another machine.

Host: Hem (Microsoft)
Q: The ExtractPatchXMLData function is new in the 3.0 version. How can I get the same information about a patch (Target version, Updated version,..) with Windows Installer 2.0
A: MsiExtractPatchXMLData API is available only on Windows Installer 3.0. If you need this information then you need to install Windows Installer 3.0. However, this information is already inside the MSP's summary information stream. Y=ou can view most of this information using Orca 3.0 as well.

Host: Chris (Microsoft)
Q: Will Orca 3.0 work on MSI 2.0?
A: Yes, but some functionality will be disabled. 3.0 style patches may not be viewable in the "patch viewing" mode, etc.

Host: KenWong (Microsoft)
Q: Many Microsoft and other vendor applications leave around boat loads of registry keys, folders, files and short cuts. Does version 3.0 offer anything that helps make an uninstall look like the application was never there?
A: Given that the install is Windows Insatller based, a component could be orphaned during uninstall if for example it is marked as permanent or shared between products. It really depends on the authoring of the package.

Host: Hem (Microsoft)
Q: Will the Intel x64 require different Template Summary Property than AMD64? Meaning if we want pure 64bit package, will will need a compleltely different package for Intel x64, AMD64 and Itanium 64?
A: That is feature work for Windows Installer 3.1. Windows Installer 3.1 will be part of Server 2003 SP1 release.

Moderator: Andy (Microsoft)
Thanks all for joining and thanks to our experts!

Host: Tyler (Microsoft)
I wanted to let everyone know of our upcoming Windows Installer chats. October's chat will be on October 12 at 11:00 AM and the topic will be "Using the Driver Install Frameworks with the Windows Installer" so if you are interested in installation of drivers using the Windows Installer, this chat is for you. November's chat will be on November 9 and the topic will be "Using WiX to author your Windows Installer packages" so if you have heard about WiX or are using WiX, this chat is for you.

Host: Tyler (Microsoft)
We look forward to seeing you all at future Windows Installer chats.

For further information on this topic please visit the following:

Newsgroups: microsoft.public.platformsdk.msi

Microsoft Windows Installer Transcripts: Read the archive of past MSI chats.

Website: Visit the Management Technologies Community Center site.

Website: Visit the Microsoft Windows Installer site.

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