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.
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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.
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
Working with VS2017 Community I have written a service that works on my local machine. I followed the instruction here:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/framework/windows-services/walkthrough-creating-a-windows-service-application-in-the-component-designer
and installed it successfully using Installutil.exe (as per instructions in above link). All good.
I now want to deploy that across six servers in our organisation. In Microsoft's documentation about installing services (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/framework/windows-services/how-to-install-and-uninstall-services) it says:
If you’re a developer who wants to release a Windows Service that users can install and uninstall you should use InstallShield
and links to a page that applies to VS2012 (can't post any more links as my reputation<10)
I have downloaded and installed the "Microsoft Visual Studio 2017 Installer Projects" package, which allows me to create a Setup Project. When I run it, it installs the project output correctly (i.e. copies the exe & dll files to the correct folder in Program Files) but does not create the service.
There's a detailed post about deploying services on this site (question 9021075) but when I follow those instructions I get a 1001 error on Install.
All the documentation I can find refers to earlier versions of VS or the previous Installer package, so I'm not even certain if I can do it with the software I am using.
So, with VS2017 Community using Microsoft Visual Studio 2017 Installer Projects, how to I create a stand-alone Installer to deploy a service that works correctly when installed locally using InstallUtil?
Or can I use InstallUtil on the target machines? I think I'd need to install Visual Studio on them for that, which I'd prefer not to. Is there a quicker way?
I only have 6 servers to install this on, so even some manual work-around might do.
Thank you for the responses. I now have a solution. I found InstallUtil on the Target Server (in my case it was in C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework64\v4.0.30319 but search will find it). I copied and added that to my project as content so when I now deploy it, I have InstallUtil in the same folder as my EXE.
To install, I run CMD as admin, cd to project folder and issue command:
installutil.exe myService.exe
This is a one-off task. Once the service is working, to update it I just need to stop it, upload the new myService.exe (& any DLLs) to overwrite the old ones and restart it again.
Further information about settings you're using for the serviceProcessInstaller1 and serviceInstaller1 files will be needed to debug this issue, as the 1001 error raised by the installer is a generic error.
An alternative way of doing this is to use Topshelf, which is a framework for hosting services written using the .NET framework. It simplifies the creation of services, allowing developers to create a simple console application that can be installed as a service using Topshelf. The reason for this is simple: It is far easier to debug a console application than a service. And once the application is tested and ready for production, Topshelf makes it easy to install the application as a service.
Alternatively, you could use InstallUtil.exe. It is part of the .NET Framework, so no need to install Visual Studio.
Our IT-department wants a script for everything that should be installed on any of our servers. They don't want to use installation wizards and click next-next-next (don't ask me why)
We need to install Office Web Apps Server to be used with our SharePoint 2013 solution.
Is it possible to install this without having to use the wizard? (with a script)
in Office Web Apps server folders, there is a folder called Files\setupsilent\ where you will find config.xml. this file contain information about silent installation of Office Web Apps Server.
call the installer like this (if your Office Web Apps server installer is extracted in c:\OWA)
setup.exe /config files\setupsilent\config.xml
this will be complete silent setup. You will not see any screens. If you like to see wizard and progress bar proceeding automatically (passive), you can change the
"Display Level="none" in this config.xml
to
Display Level="basic"
hope it helps.
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.