Personally I like Windows Installation package which can be built
right from VS 2008 because it is highly accessible (as I find it) and
it provides a wealth of features like registry editing, custom desktop
and start menu shortcuts, custom application program structure, launch
conditions and custom actions and a decent set of dialogs to customize
setup user interface.
With custom actions, you can run a script or even an executable
(behind the seen) during installation to configure something that
cannot be done with features the package provides.
The minimum prerequisite for an application is .NET framework. Beyond
that, you have full control what to specify as a prerequisite; in case
of an optional prerequisite, just don't specify anything for it in the
installation, instead, when the application runs, at appropriate
place, determine whether or not it is available and take action based
on that.
HTH!
On 3/25/10, Donald Marang <donald.marang@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Can you create a Windows Installation package within Visual Studio 2008
or
is it an external tool? Do most of you developers use a Microsoft
Installation packager tool or do you prefer a different tool, like Inno
Setup? What would a installation packager do in the case of the MODI
prerequisites on a computer that does not have Microsoft Office 2003 or
2007? Would it still fail if my application had an option to select
between
multiple OCR Engines, thus making MODI not a true prerequisite?
Don Marang
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Varun Khosla" <varun.lists@xxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, March 25, 2010 6:06 AM
To: <programmingblind@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: Deployment with Visual Studio 2008
Hi,
The publish command you have seen is for creating click once
installation for applications that are downloaded and installed in a
special subdirectory under documents and settings and are subject to
real-time updates as and when they are available.
The other type of installation is windows installation in which a
package file (.msi) and a bootstrapper file (setup.exe) are created
and can be distributed offline and never look for update — although
you can achieve the same with click once — but it's not ment to be
used that way.
Well, you can run an executable file from anywhere in your computer
and on any other machine if the specified system has all the
dependencies installed. The foremost one (as you mentioned) is the
.NET framework (the version must be greater than or equal to the one
used to build the application).
As you mentioned, you are using Office Imaging app for your
application, so the same must also be available on the host system.
Yes if you have all the dependencies present on a system, you do not
need to install the application; however, installation helps in cases
where you are distributing the application and you do not know whether
the potential user's system satisfy all the dependency requirements
and thus you do not want such users to see "fail to run the
application because ..." or "it's not a valid win32 application ....".
Instead, the installer automatically installs the required
dependencies.
HTH!
On 3/25/10, Donald Marang <donald.marang@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I have an alpha version of my QuickOCR application ready to post to a
personal website. It was written in Visual Basic .Net using Visual
Studio
2008. It is meant to be a quick and dirty method to efficiently OCR
screen
snapshots and files. Currently it relies on the Microsoft Office
Document
Imageing (MODI) tools in Office 2003 and 2007. It does more than I
expected, like MODI officially only supports MDI and some TIFF files.
In
practice, it handles many others.
I would appreciate feedback and I have a few design and deployment
questions. The source is at:
http://mysite.verizon.net/marangs/QuickOCR.html
There is an "QuickOCREnhancements.rtf" file that lists the known
deficiencies and expresses my future ideas for this application.
I have not figured out the strange Publish options in Visual Studio.
It
clearly provides for deployment from a CD or an IIS web server. The
most
common deployment, a single executable setup file copied or downloaded
from
anywhere is not so clear. Could someone give me some pointers or
direction?
I have not created Windows applications in over a decade. What are the
advantages to having the application installed and involved in the
registry
fiasco vs just a stand-alone application? Is it possible to have a
simple
Windows application with a Graphical User Interface which does not
require
installation? How is this done? Is the executable in the Debug
directory
useable elsewhere on my computer? Can it be distributed to other
computers?
I assume at the least, .Net 3.5 must be installed on their computer.
Would
this be different if the application had no interface, just command
line
options?
I have a design layout question as well, but perhaps that should be a
separate message.
Don Marang
--
Varun
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