How can I create a setup file in visual basic 6 after completion of my programming work?
Front End language is Visual Basic 6,
Backend : MS Access 2003 and
Report Tools : Crystal Report 8.5. Operating System Windows XP.
You need to be a little clearer about some of this.
"Front end/back end" is really terminology and a thought pattern from the MS Access world. It doesn't really apply to VB6 development in any meaningful way unless you're doing something really odd like automating instances of MS Access.
That's about the only place where any "MS Access runtime" comes in as well. If you're actually using Access Reporting you might be doing this though - which seems odd but anything is possible.
See Deploying Complex Microsoft Office Access Runtime-Based Solutions.
Much more likely what you are trying to say is that you have a VB6 program that is using a Jet MDB as an embedded database, and using Crystal Reports 8.5 for reporting.
There should be no issue about any "runtime" for Jet on Windows XP, since Jet 4.0 is shipped as part of the OS even as far back as XP RTM (gold). It is also extremely unlikely that XP will have an MDAC release any older than 2.7 (see Microsoft Data Access Components (MDAC) release history).
So this leaves you looking for a way to package your VB6 program, any immediate dependencies such as possibly the VB6 runtime components, and the Crystal Reports 8.5 runtime components. You may also have INI files, etc. to bundle in there.
A long, long time ago (1998?) the PDWizard was replaced for most purposes by Visual Studio 6.0 Installer 1.0, and shortly after VSI 1.1 was released (1999?) which made up for a number of ills. This is a pretty basic tool for authoring Windows Installer packages, but it should meet your needs.
Along with this you'll want the recent merge modules for your dependencies: Merge Modules for Service Pack 6 for Visual Basic 6.0 and Visual C++ 6.0.
Then of course you need a merge module for Crystal Reports 8.5, and for this we have to turn to the community because BO didn't start releasing them until CR9. One place to look for this is InstallSite: Seagate Crystal Reports 8. Your real problem is that CR8.5 is ancient.
If this doesn't work out for you, you can always hope that CR8.5 Dev installed on your machine with a "good enough" set of .DEP files (which tell setup authoring tools what subdependencies each dependency has, among other things). This may still let you use VSI 1.1 to succesfully package your application with CR8.5.
You might also look at for-pay packaging tools as already suggested. If desperate enough you might look at some legacy installer technologies too, just in case their communities have addressed your issues.
If I misunderstood and you really do use your VB6 program to automate an instance of the "MS Access 2003 Runtime" you'll probably have to build some hybrid package.
But normal VB programs do not use Access or Access Runtimes to open and work with Jet databases.
You can search google for package and deployment vb6
and you will find millions of links showing in steps how to do that.
The Package & Deployment Wizard is quite primitive and not well-suited to distributing things like the MS Access runtime and Crystal Reports. You'd be better off using one of the more powerful commercial products like InstallShield or Setup Factory. However, these can be pricey (especially InstallShield).
There are also free products like Inno Setup and Nullsoft, but these may not be as easy to use or may lack some important features.
Bob's suggestion of using Visual Studio Installer 1.1 for a Visual Basic 6 application is sound but the Microsoft link he has given for the download does not work. I guess MS thinks nobody needs VB6 anymore. After searching a little I found a 2008 snapshot of MSDN page in web.archive.org complete with setup files:
http://web.archive.org/web/20080513102621/http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vstudio/aa718352.aspx
Good suggestions above.
While it might seem unlikely that VB6 app could possibly be in use, there are those of us in the public sector that keep VB6-like apps and even Access apps alive because public dollars are not in a hurry to replace app that still work. A frequent mantra heard in many places is that you leave it alone if it is not broken. Broken enough that is--otherwise baling wire works just fine as long as VB/VBA developers can still found.
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I've been trying to install VSCommunity Edition for the last few hours with no luck. If you check the screenshot attached. You'll see that I can change the directories for installation for the first 2 requirements, but im unable to change the directory for the 3rd option (the SDK install along with others) which just happen to be the very large percentage of files. It's wanting to install over 45gb of files on my C Drive which is just a 50gb SSD.
enter image description herehttps://i.imgur.com/burFR90.jpg
I want to switch to D, and the only thing i can see fro any of the Microsoft help docs and posts is "You can change this upon fresh installation".
Which this is. I've uninstalled anything else remotely like it just to be sure.
Do any of you have any ideas or any experience with this issue, or anything i can try? I simply don't have enough space to install on C, and because of this, i can't start learning c# which is required for work.
Thanks so much in advance guys, it's really getting me worried now.
Although I can only guess why Visual Studio is locking down the SDK path, here's a few workarounds and recommendations:
In your screenshot, the installer warns you about possible performance effects of installing Visual Studio on your D drive. I assume this is because your D drive is not an SSD. Microsoft's Visual Studio system requirements document recommends that you install to an SSD, and based on community experience, this is one recommendation you really want to stick to, otherwise IDE responsiveness may be well below your expectations, especially if you decide to install extensions in future.
Instead, you might want to reconsider the set of components that you're installing. If you're only getting started with C#, you'll probably be just fine with developing class libraries, console and web applications targeting .NET Framework or .NET Core. If this is the case, you might want to go to the Workloads tab in the installer and opt out of some of the heaviest workloads (such as Mobile development with .NET). Consider only installing .NET desktop development, ASP.NET and web development, Azure development and .NET Core cross-platform development. If you only select these, your installation is going to be much slimmer.
If minimizing Visual Studio installation as shown above isn't enough, consider an alternative way of setting up your .NET development environment. For example, you can download and install .NET Core SDK and .NET Core Runtime, and use one of the two most prominent alternative code editors: Visual Studio Code or JetBrains Rider that are both quite compact.
I'm looking for Qt packager for my Qt application targeted for windows platform.
I need it to create a nice installer to deploy and distribute my product on windows PC.
Which is best and recommended FREE packager?
For packaging I use the WIX (Windows Installer XML) toolset.
There are several advantages to using WIX:
Free and open-source
Creates MSI files, which allows your application to be easily deployed across large networks and correctly uninstalls (also very important)
Supported and developed by Microsoft, it is used by several other Microsoft teams internally, e.g the Visual Studio 11 Developer Preview installer features some of the latest WIX features
XML configuration allows reuse of components of installers (sets of files, feature sets)
Several types of user interface, new wizard pages can be created
Integrates into Visual Studio
Integrates into MSBuild - can allow consistent packaging to ensure you don't ship debug versions
I have used WIX for installers at work and for my own projects at home.
It isn't as simple as other solutions to get started, but once you've created a simple package, you'll find it easy to add new features.
NSIS is the way to go in my opinion. Straight forward scripting, compatible with all Microsoft Operating Systems and with support for User Levels.
Plus it has a huge active forum for any specific help you may need. I use the HMNSIS editor to write the scripts and have not come across anything it hasn't been able to do yet!
Qt has nothing that can help you, but the free Windows installer package creator is without a doubt NSIS
Inno Setup is a another good, free, light-weight installer system.
There is the Qt Installer Framework. That is a link to the manual for it. It is multi-platform. With it, you write XML files in a directory structure for delivery of components in the directories, called packages. It has scripting. You then compile it into a setup for your target platform.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I was under the impression that they did not make it available to users of the Community edition until recent versions. When the earlier replies were written, it may well have been commercial version only.
Alas, nothing seems to warn you that you have to collect up components, nor tell you what they are, or even talk about the process; except that the 3rd. party, but free (Windows only), Dependency Walker can tell you what dynamic libraries are being used. I don't find it a necessity, but it can be helpful. (Tip: On Windows anyway, be sure to put "qwindows.dll" in a "platforms" directory with the exe. Tip #2: Make sure the Qt DLL's or static libraries are ones compiled for your compiler.)
I really want to upgrade to Visual Studio 2010. But since I do a lot of development for the Pocket PC version of Windows Mobile I cannot. (I develop for a Symbol device that does not support Windows Phone 7, so that is not a option.)
Does any one know any kind of time frame of when Microsoft plans to add support for Smart Device Projects into Visual Studio 2010?
Update: Since this is looking less and less likely without intervention from the users, Please go here and vote for this feature.
Microsoft's current public statement says that, apart from Windows Phone 7 development, there will not be Smart Device Application Development added to Visual Studio 2010.
This obviously raises concerns and has implications for a lot of people, and there are more than a few of us lobbying Microsoft very hard to change that plan and to get them to include some sort of support for Smart Device programming outside of Windows Phone.
I'm hopeful, maybe even optimistic, that their stance will change and that we will get something - even if it's only CF 3.5 targeting actual hardware (i.e. no emulator support) - at some point down the road. Right now they've got all hands on deck trying to get Windows Phone out the door, and until that happens, I wouldn't expect much for resource allocation toward other device features.
So what does that actually mean? In my mind I wouldn't postpone installing VS2010 until they have device support. My guess is it won't happen until early next year at the absolute earliest and realistically I would say mid to late next year if it happens at all. Again, I'm optimistic that it will, but I'm also a realist, so I'm not going to base my business decisions and future on it happening.
Add your support to the following Microsoft Connect Item, it's had quite a bit of interest being the 3rd highest voted suggestion so far.
http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/595712/no-support-for-windows-ce-and-compact-framework-development-in-vs2010
Through private conversations I've had with the Customer Advocacy Team at MS it would appear that they are really digging their heels in over this. MS reneged on promises to include Smart Device Framework support in VS2010 early on in the product life cycle.
It is really frustrating because at some point the development tools will fragment and you'll end up with having to maintain separate development, source control and build systems for targeting Windows CE. Who is to say that the tools will even work on future versions of Windows either or even if they will live side by side with future versions of VS. Remember this lack of support also hurts people doing unmanaged code on CE too.
MS is doing a great job of remaining silent here, the silence is already causing people to look at alternative platforms. Without a statement of intent no business is going to invest in Windows CE development without knowing the future of the OS and the tools to develop on it.
All recent Visual Studio versions can be installed side by side. You could upgrade now for desktop development, then when smart device support is rolled out, migrate your projects to VS2010.
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en/setupprerelease/thread/fce95ec7-728d-41d1-ab13-74a2fd3a4136
I am forced to have two VS installations side by side. However, another issue - that is causing me more pain is that TFS 2010 doesn't work with VS 2008 - there is a plugin, of course, but there are many issues with it which make it unusable.
So to have source control, I have installed SVN on my machine.
Microsoft once again, has proven that they have no concern for the devs at all. Their tools don't work together, backward compatibility is not there, all of which makes their dev tools a big load of crap.
MS replied to that connect issue:
Hi folks,
In the first quarter of 2013, we plan to provide tooling for Visual
Studio 2012 to create apps for Windows Embedded Compact v.Next. We’ll
be announcing more details in September, including the roadmap for
.NET CF. You can find more details this Fall in the Windows Embedded
Compact website at http://www.windowsembedded.com.
thanks, Doug Turnure Visual Studio PM
I want to trial Windows 7 but wondered if anyone who has done so already ran into any issues specifically related to development?
i.e. problems with VS2008, SQL Management Studio and SQL Server, MySQL, PHP etc. etc.
Examples from XP -> Vista: in Vista there was a sudden loss of an SMTP server. And there were initially (if I remember correctly) issues with VS2005 with I seem to remember a patch coming out later to remedy.
EDIT: or on the contrary any big advantages or benefits to developing on Windows 7!
I been using windows 7 for a while now.
I been using VS2008, netbeans, tomcat, sql manager studio, mysql etc...
And i actually find it more stable and faster then windows vista.
There aren't many advantages to developing on Windows 7 before it's released. Most development features are a function of the IDE, not the OS. So, you might want to consider instead if you should be developing on Visual Studio 2010 instead of VS2008. Instead, you're more likely to have compatibility issues, although for the most part, Windows 7 is much more compatible with existing software than Vista was when it was in beta.
There could be one advantage to developing for Windows 7 before it's released -- you have a head start in taking advantage of features that competitors haven't yet, giving you an advantage in the market. That's the theory at least. That assumes you're going to develop something that uses a feature only available in Windows 7. That assumes you wouldn't be better off with the larger number of sales you'd get by developing something that works on existing platforms.
The only issue I've encountered so far involves compiling older vanilla C programs with Visual C++. You're usually presented with an error like so:
mt.exe : general error c101008d:
Failed to write the updated manifest
to the resource of file
".\Release\SomeProgram.exe". The
binary is not a valid Windows image.
You have to add an empty resource file to the solution.
More on the issue here.
I've never gotten any of the new audio stack examples working; thus this question. API works, documentation is... a bit lacking at the moment; sure to be fixed by RTM.
Other than that, Windows 7 has been faster than and just as stable as Vista (2 crashes from RTM, 0 crashes after SP1) was for me. Truly, you should be developing on Vista and testing on Windows 7 RC as a general practice with respect to pre-release operating systems; but I think we'll get away with it just fine in this particular case.
My advice would be to not develop on Windows 7. Note that I don't mean you shouldn't target it as a platform, just that you should be doing your development on a stable platform.
I personally won't trust a new release of Windows (or Linux for that matter) until it's been in the wild as a proper product (not release candidate) for many months. For Windows, I tend to wait until the first real service pack plus a month for all the nigglies to be fixed.
For Linux, I'm still using Ubuntu 8.04 LTS, not 8.1, and certainly not the 9 alphas.
Test machines are another matter, you should always have one at the "latest and greatest" level for testing, but I consider the development machine of prime importance, needing a stable platform.
No problems from my end yet, been working on a c# app with visual studio 2008 x64, and php web apps with dreamweaver cs3 and netbeans.
Windows7 seems to be just vista with more bells and wistles and a bit more responsive, not to sure if to much really change "under the hood" so to speak. But I have nothing to back that statement up with...
I've been using Win7 for a couple of months now and never had a problem. I went straight from XP to 7 and the only problems I faced were related to configuring SourceGear Vault to work with IIS7...other than that,it's been all good.
I use VS 2005, VS 2008, SQL Server 2005, Infragistics NetAdvantage, and a couple of third party components.
Although I haven't seen any advantages for the development side of the applications, I'd recommend you to upgrade to Win7 only for the better feel of a complete OS. I mean XP was good, but I really dig Win7.
With the upcoming release of Visual Studio 2010, and all the lovely new features in C# 4.0, I would really love to update from 2008. However, over the last few years, I've managed to get student pricing, or even free versions via the MSDN Academic Alliance.
Now I am no longer a student.
I can't seem to justify the $AU500 pricetag of even the Standard version for what is at the moment, essentially a hobby. As much as I may like for it to be, it just isn't paying the bills.
So, I've read on the Microsoft site that there's no non-commercial clause in the Express version EULA which is good because I do the occasional bit of paid work in it. How much is missing from the Express version though, compared to Professional (what I use currently, and what the 2010 beta is)? Am I likely to go through withdrawal pains as I reach for something that just isn't there?
As far as addons go, the only one I've really played with is VisualSVN, and I can live with just using TortoiseSVN manually. Anything else I should be aware of?
Version comparisons can be found here: (For 2008) (Edit: A far more in depth document can be downloaded from here)
The things that leap out to me as features I wouldn't want to be without are:
Extensibility (no plugins like VisualSVN or Resharper)
Source Code Control
Remote debugging
64-bit compiler support (x64) (from the first link, though the document implies you can make 64bit apps...)
SQL Server 2005 integration
No setup projects (for making MSI installers)
Limited refactoring
Some missing debugging tools (especially the threads window)
If you can live without those (and the other limitations that wouldn't bother me personally) then I guess that you'll get by with Express just fine.
Final thought: Express isn't your only option for free .net development, there is also SharpDevelop which has some advantages (SVN integration, compact framework support) over Express. Though I'm sure it has many limitations too.
Do you do any entrepreneurial work? If you're building the next killer app, check out BizSpark: http://www.microsoft.com/bizspark/
There is new program now available from Microsoft to allow web developers to access the Microsoft Stack similar to the BizSpark program.
It is called Website Spark. VS 2008 Professional Edition and SQL Server 2008 Web Editon are some of the tools available through the program.
Of all things I would probably miss the ability to install extensions. Especially tools like AnkhSVN and TestDriven.NET have grown invaluable to me...
I would seriously consider investing some money in purchasing VS especially if you can get some of that back by using it for jobs.
Maybe switching to Eclipse and Java is an option for you?
EDIT:
By the way, investing a few hundred dollars is common among ex-students. If you were a designer you would probably have to invest $1000 on Adobe software.
You won't be able to have solutions with multiple project types (so no mixed language solutions), or solution folders either.
The main thing that is missing is the ability to build an installer for a solution.
The work-around is to build the installer using some open source installer for .NET, e.g. WiX.
And multi-language solutions are more cumbersome (e.g. mixed C# and VB.NET).
I use the Professional version, but I didn't experience any problems with opening and building my project/solution in the Express Edition.