SQL Server 2017 Express silent installation - installation

With our Installer, Customer wants us to check if the SQL server is installed or not and it is not installed, the installer should install it. Also, the installation should be silent and not ask anything to the user as they are not techies. Now by sending the full SQL server 2017 express installer along our application could be one option but that will make the installer size very big. To avoid that, I thought of the online installer. But the online installer seems not to be taking arguments and throwing exception. Customer and Project team don't want user's involvement. Could any of you guys suggest any other option where I can sent the small Online installer and launch it with some command line options / configuration to achieve this?

Not sure what tool do you use to create your setup packages, but the Advanced Installer packaging tool addresses your requirement. You can have a look on Install SQL Server 2017 Silently/with BasicUI tutorial on their online docs. Hope this helps somehow.
Disclaimer: I use Advanced Installer tool to package my .Net application.

Related

Custom installer for application in Visual Studio 2017

I need to generate an installer for my application but first I need to know if it is already installed on the system node.js, npm and other applications
Is it possible to include the installation of node.js within the installation of my application and to know if it is already installed?
I'm using Visual Studio 2017 and a WPF project for desktop applications
When the application is already installed I need to execute npm commands in the console for this reason I need to install them before or verify if they are installed correctly
I appreciate any help.
UPDATE: Advanced Installer: How to install a NodeJS web app. Really excellent videos IMHO.
Best Effort: I don't know much about Node.Js, and hence should not answer. But I haven't seen anyone else answering these questions either. Despite lacking experience, let me try to give a few suggestions.
Windows Installer: There seems to be an MSI you can use to deploy Node.Js. And there are some alternatives listed. (Essentially Chocolatey and Scoop).
Heads-Up: I have answered a more specific deployment question relating to a failed installation of the Node.Js MSI earlier: Node.js installation (windows installer) terminates prematurely on windows 10 64-bit. This may or may not be fixed.
Deployment: To deploy a prerequisite MSI before your own package installation, you can use a deployment tool capable of bootstrapping / sequencing / downloading - in other words to run several installation operations in a given sequence wrapped as a setup.exe. Or you could investigate the Chocolatey approach. With regards to the deployment tools, I am a bit tired of writing up the list of capacities these tools have and don't have. I will link to a few flavors of answers for this:
Prime Suspects:
Installshield Suite Projects - screenshot of Suite projects.
WiX Burn Bundle - beware: link overload. But there is a "Hello Burn" example. Official WiX documentation.
Advanced Installer - Prerequisites View - screenshot of view available in some project types.
One of the above tools should be able to do the job. Only WiX Burn is free and open source. Sometimes you can save a lot of time by going with a commercial tool. Obviously especially if your company already have a license for such a tool (which can be a days work to figure out).
Free Tools: In the realm of free-tools only and alternatives to WiX, some people use self-extracting archives made with 7-Zip and WinRAR and some other tools described here: Combine exe and msi file in one installer. I don't like this for security reasons and other reasons as explained in the link.
Simplicity: For corporate deployment a simple batch file or some custom construct distributed via your deployment system (SCCM, etc...) could suffice. Or even a zip with an embedded batch file to kick off your zipped installers in sequence could work. All depends on your scenario. I wouldn't roll with such an approach for global distribution.
And here are several other answers where I describe available deployment tools:
How to create a MSI file which simply copies a directory to Program Files?
Visual Studio 2017 Installer Project - include VC++ 2015 Redistributable
Some Links:
Create MSI from extracted setup files
Error Creating a 7-zip installer package
How to create windows installer
What installation product to use? InstallShield, WiX, Wise, Advanced Installer, etc
Nodejs - Another installation is in progress

How to create thin setup for Windows MSI Installer?

We have windows application in which we distribute whole MSI package to the client in zip form. We are now up for licensing feature and we want to allow users to work in thin setup just like if you download Visual Studio to install, it will download the files from the server and install it rather than we download whole 20GB VS setup from the server.
We want to use the web-based installer in which we can manage the licensing features too.
Can anyone help or redirect to useful links? It will be a pleasure.

Install Performance Tools for SQL Server 2008

We have SQL Server 2005 Enterprise Edition here.
I have been using SQL Server Management Studio 2008 for connecting to our Data Source - this has been working fine for the last year.
When I first got here, I found an article on this site that stated that to install Management Studio, you just down the SQL Server Express 2005/2008 installer. Once installed, it will give you access to features according to the SQL Server version of the Data Source (this worked a treat).
I now need to use SQL Profiler, but it isn't present in SQL Server 2008 Management Studio.
Through searching online, I apparently need to tick the "Management Tools - Complete" option - but this option is not present on the installer.
I am using SQLEXPRWT_x64_ENU.exe to attempt to install this but the feature is not present, it only has "Management Tools - Basic" available.
There does not seem to be a way to point the installer at my Data Source, so that it can see that it will be used with an Enterprise licensed server.
I have tried downloading various versions, but still the "Complete" option is missing.
Is there an installer that I can download with this option enabled, or do I have to ask my support services team to speak to Microsoft to provide a special installation program for me to get this facility?
Any help on this issue will be greatly appreciated.
MS does not provide the SqlProfiler with Express versions of Sql Server. I have been looking for a profiler alternative myself, found ExpressProfiler on Codeplex but its a bit crude and not very configurable. This one works quite nicely: http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/784905/Real-time-Tracing-With-SQL-Server-Express

Automatic installer for a web app on Windows 7 (or higher)

I have a web application implemented in ASP.NET MVC3 and SQL Server 2008 Express. It's relatively small so I can deploy it in local computer of my clients (Windows 7 or higher).
Currently, I deploy it manually by create new web site in IIS, copy published files to the folder of website, install SQL Server 2008R2 and use Management Studio to restore database with some initial data.
It's OK with me but not with my clients. They can't do the same things. What I want is an automatic installer, my clients just need to click a few buttons to get all done.
Specifically, this automatic installer must do the following things:
Install SQL Server 2008R2 Express and restore the initial database.
Install IIS7 (if it's not enabled in Windows 7).
Create a new app pool (V4) and a new Web Site use this pool. Then copy published files to the folder of the Web Site.
The installler can run aspnet_regiis command and grant permission for NETWORK SERVICE account to TEMP folder. This is required for web site to run.
The installer can copy some fonts to Font folder of Windows.
I see many app can do this automatic installer, but after googling I can't find a thorough solution to try.
Please give me some advice on this. Thanks in advance!
If you want a free solution, WiX is what you need, but it will take you some time to learn using it if you never created a package with it.
A more easy to use, and also powerful, but payed tool, is Advanced Installer, you need Professional edition, but you can try it for free with the 30 days trial mode. It has predefined prerequisite for SQL Server Express, built-in support to install IIS entities, and set file/folder permissions. Bassically all the requirements you need.
To enable any IIS feature you can simply add a PowerShell script.

How to install powershell as a prerequisite?

I am using Visual Studio 2010 setup project
I don't think you are allowed to redistribute PowerShell. And at any rate, it is built in to Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2. All the other platforms have separate installers as well. I think it would be best to just notify your customers that they need PowerShell 2.0.
I had a similar problem in the StudioShell installer - wanted to make sure PoSh 2.0 is installed. I did a cursory check for the executable with a minimum version number, and added a launch condition that notified the user of the missing prerequisite and offered to open a web page to the PowerShell download. Seemed like the most legally helpful approach.
There is a way, albiet requiring you to build some MSI thing manually that will get it from MS and install it for you. I know the exchange install used that technique. You can also get a license/permission from MS to redistribute the official installers.

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