You should look at what your application needs installed to run rather than what InstallShield does in the package it generated. Before I joined IES our packages were created by the IT "manager" (he 'managed' a team consisting of himself) in InstallShield. They were massively bloated with a lot of controls & pre-requisites which weren't even applicable to our application (it was written in Visual Studio 2003 using MFCs, didn't even need a vcredist back then just a couple of MS DLL's in the same dir as the app). I expect a lot of this was due to his incompetence in using InstallShield but some of it was definitely InstallShield trying to do more than it should.
Easy way should be to ask your dev team to supply installation requirements & work from there to write your WiX code. Back in reality, I've found the best way is to get yourself a Virtual Machine, copy your application's fileset (not installer) to the VM & then see what steps you have to take to get the app to run properly. You can then write your spec from these steps & it also means you can send your spec to your dev team & QA team to test your installer does exactly what they expect it to & if it doesn't, they can update the spec & send it back to you. BTW when testing on VM's make sure you don't just test using an account with Administrator privileges use a normal 'User' account too & don't believe dev's when they say "oh you have to use 'Run as Administrator' on Vista for it to work" because if it really does then it's a terribly written application which no self-respecting IT administrator is going to roll out in a corporate environment. Good Luck. Palbinder Sandher Software Deployment & IT Administrator T: +44 (0) 141 945 8500 F: +44 (0) 141 945 8501 http://www.iesve.com **Design, Simulate + Innovate with the <Virtual Environment>** Integrated Environmental Solutions Limited. Registered in Scotland No. SC151456 Registered Office - Helix Building, West Of Scotland Science Park, Glasgow G20 0SP Email Disclaimer -----Original Message----- From: Blair [mailto:os...@live.com] Sent: 29 October 2009 05:54 To: 'General discussion for Windows Installer XML toolset.' Subject: Re: [WiX-users] - MDAC merge module I found the following resources looking at this: In 2002, a file called "MDAC Merge Module.doc" contains links to a "sample" MSM (that won't work on Vista w/ UAC AFAICT) along with instructions to change it from the included MDAC 2.7 (no idea which release) to whatever other version you wish to install. It also appears that the latest MDAC available is 2.8 SP1, with the following notation: "Important Note: Don't install MDAC 2.6 or later on SQL Server 7.0 or 6.5 clustered installations; doing so will break your cluster." BTW, 2.8 SP1 is 4-1/2 years old (2005). Digging into how it is implemented, it has a component (with a fixed guid) it uses to condition the custom actions used to extract and run the MDAC installer named "Mdac_typ.exe" (to a fixed directory in the user's Temp folder), it supplies a dialog to entertain the user for non-silent installs, it disables rollback because it can't uninstall what it installs (scheduling itself right before InstallFinalize), doesn't use deferred actions (or commit actions, which is what Windows Installer itself does when dealing with code that can't rollback), and a couple of other minor horror stories (it uses MFC to implement its dialog), all coded with VC++ 6 (a great compiler, I still like it, but I don't think you could even get it anymore). Given that various flavors of 2.8, 2.7, 2.5, and who knows what else (Microsoft downloads reports 66 MDAC related downloads available) I would be interested in knowing more about this before attempting to supply a solution. I could certainly code this up and contribute it to the community, but I would probably do so as a WiX v3 WixExtension instead of as an MSM (but one that would be 100% "compatible" with other implementations of other MSMs based on this MSFT-supplied one in the "end result", meaning it would continue to suffer whatever deficiencies exist in the current implementation, except I would experiment with correcting the worst egregious things it does), but I would let you select which version you would install (out of a limited selection, I suppose 2.8sp1 and 2.5, unless people needed others). I would supply source code but I would charge a very nominal amount for my time (for the first few downloads, anyway, except it will be free for those that sign up to beta-test it) which would include full source-code (licensed with Common Public License Version 1.0, the same license WiX uses). A quick internet search of MDAC reveals: ----------- >From Wikipedia (which also indicates the latest supported OSs are XP >and 2003): Microsoft Data Access Components (commonly abbreviated MDAC; also known as Windows DAC) is a framework of interrelated Microsoft technologies that allows programmers a uniform and comprehensive way of developing applications that can access almost any data store. Its components include: ActiveX Data Objects (ADO), OLE DB, and Open Database Connectivity (ODBC). There have been several deprecated components as well, such as the Microsoft Jet Database Engine, MSDASQL (the OLE DB provider for ODBC), and Remote Data Services (RDS). Some components have also become obsolete, such as the former Data Access Objects API and Remote Data Objects. The first version of MDAC was released in August 1996. At that time Microsoft stated MDAC was more a concept than a stand-alone program and had no widespread distribution method. Later Microsoft released upgrades to MDAC as web-based redistributable packages. Eventually, later versions were integrated with Microsoft Windows and Internet Explorer, and in MDAC 2.8 SP1 they ceased offering MDAC as a redistributable package. Throughout its history MDAC has been the subject of several security flaws, which led to attacks such as an escalated privileges attack, although the vulnerabilities were generally fixed in later versions and fairly promptly. The current version is 2.8 service pack 1, but the product has had many different versions and many of its components have been deprecated and replaced by newer Microsoft technologies. MDAC is now known as Windows DAC in Windows Vista. ----------- You indicate this interest is because of ADO. From this page: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms805169.aspx Beginning with MicrosoftR Windows 2000, MDAC is an integrated part of the operating system. Future OS releases will contain MDAC components. The MDAC SDK can be found within the Platform SDK. The Microsoft Data Access Components can be redistributed in English and 18 other languages. The redistribution package is available for download on the Microsoft Data Access and Storage Developer Center Web site. To install MDAC on Windows 98, Windows NTR 4.0, Windows 2000, WindowsR Millennium Edition, Windows XP, or Windows 2003 Server, run the setup program Mdac_typ.exe. Beginning with MDAC 2.6, MDAC is also installed as part of Microsoft SQL Server. The Mdac_typ.exe redistributable file is available on the SQL Server 2000 CD. This program installs all the files that your applications need to use the technologies in MDAC. The redistributable program does not offer an option to selectively install components; it installs all of them together or none at all. This way, all of the components are installed in the same configuration in which they were tested before leaving Microsoft, which decreases problems with mismatched versions of DLLs. MDAC is a system component, and installing MDAC should be considered similar to a system upgrade. You cannot remove MDAC without replacing operating system files that were upgraded by the MDAC installer. Many applications, including Microsoft Internet Explorer, Visual StudioR, SQL Server, and Office require MDAC for data binding and other application functions. Removing MDAC will negatively impact or break these applications. However, under certain circumstances, Microsoft Help and Support can assist you in solving installation and behavior problems. ----------- Given the above, I assume the installer should be skipped on Vista and above, under my assumption that those components still supported are shipped in box and are of a great enough version that they match MSDN. That detail will also be in my implementation. -----Original Message----- From: Daniel Hughes [mailto:daniel.hug...@tait.co.nz] Sent: Wednesday, October 28, 2009 1:34 PM To: wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net Subject: [WiX-users] - MDAC merge module we are moving our installer from install shields. One of the modules we used is called OLE DB 2.1 in install shield. Apparently this is included in MDAC. Microsoft does not provide a merge module for this but does state: "If you are using a third-party authoring tool, an MDAC merge module may already be available to merge into your .msi package. Contact your authoring tool vendor for the availability of an MDAC merge module." So before I go to the effort of trying to create my own does one already exist that I can use. Cheers, Daniel ======================================================================= This email, including any attachments, is only for the intended addressee. 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