So I made this executable program that uses the Windows library and some others (string, ctime, lmcons...) in C++. When it runs on my computer it works great but when I transfer the executable to a computer that does not have some of those libraries on it the program does not run. How do I "add" those libraries in with my code?
1 - You need to identify libraries that need to exist on the system in order to execute your application.
2 - you need to create a package that contain these libraries. It could be an installation or a zip file. Depending on the libraries, sometimes they need to be registered on the system, sometimes just dropped in. If you use install packaging software, you can set up registration [if needed]. If you distribute zip or ftp folder, you may need to supply script file. Sometimes libraries are part of some Microsoft package and this package can be prerequisite to run your application. You may pack it into your installation and have it installed silently. There are many ways as you see.
3 - this is up to you how you want to distribute your application and supporting libraries. But best is when user doesn't have to jump the hoops trying to install your stuff. User should click and forget.
Related
Is it hard to compile software so that it is a single .exe file? I have been publishing the program in the traditional manner and the resultant program consists of a setup file and a couple data files. Ideally I would like to have a lone exe that runs program without having to install.
In general, if you're using Visual Basic, you'll always need to, at a minimum, guarantee the target computer has the proper .NET Framework installed.
If that's the case, then you can just deploy your .exe from your Console or WIndows Application project, and it will work, provided you don't use any references or types outside of the standard framework types. If you have any assemblies you use, or require any extra data to exist, then an installer is the correct way to go.
In general, building an installer makes sure that all of the dependencies are in place, which is why it's the "traditional" manner of publishing. Without that, you (or somebody) has to verify the dependencies before running your program manually.
I need to create a custom installer that supports French, German, Spanish, Italian, Polish, Russian, English, chinese (mandarin script), more languages to be added for a .net based application.
This installer also needs to be able to check whether the target system has got adobe installed or not. If the target system doesnt have adobe or is a lower version than required then it should install from the CD. if it does then bypass that step.
The installer also needs to prompt the user to browse to any location on the system to pick up a file which will be place in the installation folder.
The installer also need to register this program in the add remove programs list.
Is there a custom installer that can do all of these tasks or do I need to build an application from scratch for it?
Thoughts... ideas???
Thanks for your time...
Short answer : Yes, all those things can be done, most of them easily.
WiX or NSIS are probably your two best free options. NSIS uses a plugin architecture for most of it's functionality, but the plugins are text-files, so you should have no problems downloading them. However, if your company is "funny" about licensing, then check the relevant licenses for each plugin early on - most are completely free to use, but Legal can fail to understand this sometimes...
Please find below pointers to the relevant sections of the documentation, so you can get it downloaded (I feel your pain by the way!)
Language Support
See Docs
Allow user to select a file and copy it
You will need the InstallOptions plugin. This allows you to create an extra page in your install wizard which can prompt for information. It allows various controls, one of which is a file explorer control (search for FileRequest in the link).
To copy the file, you cannot simply use the File instruction, as that extracts and copies files from the installation media, and will not act on files on the target computer.
Instead, you will need a plugin - e.g. this wrapper around the WinAPI. Alternatively, use the CopyFiles instruction.
Register program in Add/Remove programs
This is standard in both WiX and NSIS.
Detect Adobe is installed.
NSIS has the ability to check if registry keys exist, or named files exist, which are the two normal methods of detecting installed programs.
I would like to build a setup, or something like that (1 file), to deliver a single file to a target system. Plugin for an application, installable to users AppData folder.
After some research I'm still not sure in which direction to look. I can create the setup project with Visual Studio 2010, but all of the options so far seem to be way too heavy or have some flaws.
SetupProject stubbornly wants to create an application folder which I don't need, and complains about installation to user folder. Cab doesn't seem to offer automatic install, oneclick is not available for the project, etc.
Is there an easier setup technology I could use?
Requirements:
Install -> Copy 1 file to a folder
under %userprofile%\3rdpartyapp\ if
it exists (xcopy).
Uninstall -> Delete the file and also
one folder with custom settings
(rmdir \s).
Distribution -> Free for commercial
use.
Maybe I should just pack the file in self extracting c++ exe?
It may be overkill for one file, but I like InnoSetup for creating setup packages. Check it out, and see if it suits you. It is very easy to use and deploy.
Take a look at WiX toolset. It allows creating MSI-based installers, and the installer could be quite simple:
Search for %userprofile%\3rdpartyapp;
Copy the file into it, if it exists;
Fail install or maybe create it, if it does not exist.
Uninstall would be very simple: it would need to remove the installed file. To remove a subfolder of 3rdpartyapp, you can use RemoveFolderEx element.
MSI registers the installed app with Add/Remove Programs Control panel. Uninstall is handled by Windows Installer service, therefore you don't need to copy any additional files or programs to support uninstall.
I think any setup technology is too heavy for one file. I'd go with creating a simple application that would extract the file from its resources stream and copy it into %userprofile%\3rdpartyapp.
Uninstall is trickier: there should be something that can handle the uninstall process. It could be a batch or script (js, vbs) file stored somewhere in user's profile, another simple application or the same one. (Installation process can also be handled with a script.)
Due to severe limitations of the Microsoft Windows Installer (MSI) system it is required to create a bootstrapper in order to install multiple MSI files (due to pre/post-requisites). However, this introduces an distribution problem because you now have multiple files that need to be included with the distribution. There are of course multiple ways to distribute this as a single file.
1: An archive
You can put all the files into a single archive that users download. The obvious choice for MS Windows is of course a PK-ZIP archive. But this is not very user friendly. Users will first have to extract the archive, and then run the bootstrapper (which would be called setup.exe).
2: A SFX archive
Instead of distributing an plain archive file you could wrap it into a self extracting archive. Executing this SFX archive would prompt the user to extract and/or run the contents. But this adds yet another prompt to the whole installation process (#1: SFX prompt, #2: bootstrapper prompt, #3: main installer prompt). This is also not very user friendly, as it increase annoyance due to multiple prompts.
3: Single file bootstrapper
Of course there is the option to embed all the extract files into the bootstrapper. This is probably the most user friendly for a normal end-user. However, this is less friendly for system administrators, because usually bootstrappers are less manageable than the MSI files. An admin would rig the system so that all requisites are also installed when the main MSI is installed, thus the bootstrapper would not be needed.
4: Other?
An other unlisted method?
So what do you think is the best way to distribute a installer for MS Windows software that requires a bootstrapper?
We provide a single file bootstrapper for retail distribution and all single-user installations.
Volume licensing customers (e.g. 10+ seats) receive one (or more) MSI files along with instructions and a list of prerequsites that must be installed before our application will run (which slightly differ between XP, Vista and Win2k). The EXE blocks installation if the prerequisites are not installed, the MSI will permit installation under the assumption that the sysadmin knows what they're doing and might be installing the prereq's at the same time, before the next reboot.
Basically the single bootstrapper is for non-sysadmins, people who want a single click solution. System administrators and corporate IT support who prefer more fine grained control over their installation are happy for multiple files, even if it means more work for them. The single EXE file is available publicly, the instructions + multiple files are only available by contacting our sales team.
This method gives us the best of both worlds, as well as the ability to provide different default configurations for home and corporate customers - hints, tips, splash screens, auto-updates and welcome dialogs are all disabled by default for corporate installations but enabled for "single" users.
We use Wix to create MSI files which is hugely flexible and can easily be automated with build scripts.
To chain multiple MSI/EXE files together for distribution via single bootstrapper I would highly recommend DotNetInstaller. I'm in no way connected or affiliated with this product, but it has been a lifesaver on projects for generating highly configurable bootstrappers in unmanaged code.
I wrote up my recent experiences in developing a multi-language MSI and bootstrapper using these technologies here. This talks through the process from start to finish. Using DotNetInstaller you can download and install dependencies from a URL on demand, or embed them directly within the bootstrapper with ease. I did also consider WIX's own SETUPBLD bootstrapper generator and the GenerateBootStrapper MSBuild task but they are pretty basic. That said WIX 3.5 Burn utility is currently in the pipeline and could be a pretty decent alternative once it's released.
Regarding: 1: An archive: 2: A SFX archive
You could use a self-extracting .ZIP that automatically launches a Setup.exe. WinZip offers this support inexpensively. That way, it would be more customer-friendly. It can be configured to launch the bootstrapper without a prompt.
Regarding: 3: Single file bootstrapper
At the risk of sounding like an InstallShield salesman, InstallShield 2009 will take care of everything you're asking about -- it smooths over the MSI shortcoming of needing a bootstrapper. You could use the Release Wizard to create a single-.EXE all-in-one bootstrapper. Or you could create a web-deploy setup that is very small and then downloads the payload from a web site. Or you could put different features in separate .CAB files, and the user only needs to deploy those CAB files corresponding to the features he wants to install. InstallShield comes bundled with dozens of prerequisites ready to add to your Setup.
Depending on your siutation, MSI v4.5 and 5.0 might help you -- they have native support for multi-package transaction chaining. Of course, depending on what OSes you support, you may still need a bootstrapper to make sure the right level of MSI support is present.
I had a similar problem where I needed to distribute some optional support software, MSI installer, and another file just incase the MSI file needed it. I basically created a native application to handle the whole process. I wrote a blog about it here (http://blog.foldertrack.com/?p=45)
i'm using vs installer to build a setup package for my vb6 app.
and the problem is i can see that under the project explorer there's a list of dependencies attached to my exe file.
alt text http://img505.imageshack.us/img505/9696/croppercapture259lr8.png
and under the file system on target machine treeview, i can actually store the dll/ocx on a folder or in the windows system folder itself[the left window].
alt text http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/9224/croppercapture251qm1.png
so what i don't understand is .. is there actually a difference?
if i just set the dependencies and didn't add the dll or ocx to the folder or win sys folder, does the dll automatically get copied over too?
It is not guaranteed that all those dlls will be present on the system that the software is being installed on. So they need to be included in your installer. From there you have two choices.
You can install them in your windows system folders or in your application folder. The difference is that if you install them in your application folder you can set things up on XP and Vista so that the different version of the software with different version of the components can be fired up and run side by side. Installing them into the system folder will break any older version that depend on older version of the components.
Installing in the application folder rarely doesn't work if a component depends on other components that can't be updated. When this occurs it is usually with with Microsoft libraries. They have gotten better over the years on this issue.
You can read more about the issues involving side by side execution here
Finally the dependencies need to be in your installer so that they are registered in the Windows Registry. Unlike most .NET assemblies any ActiveX/COM application needs to have the component registered in order to use it even if you are using CreateObject and Variant types to access it.
I will admit the whole process is idiosyncratic and is one of the sources for the stories about DLL Hell. Start with the MSDN article, use wikipedia, and of course ask further questions here.
You should usually not have a "dlls" folder under the app folder for a normal Installer package but there are many factors involved (private standard DLLs, Reg-Free COM, etc.). Yes, the dependencies get included (unless you exclude them). They should each have a property that determines where they install on the target systems.
You also have a number of components in that list that are either not redistributable this way because they are OS-dependent system components, MDAC components, or not licensed for redist (fm20.dll for example).
Sadly this is an example of the type of package that can lead directly to DLL Hell for your users' systems. Fixing this can mean researching every MS component in MS KB articles to determine what can or should be redistributed and how.
Deployment can be a messy business to get right.