In other words, what's happened (and this is fairly common) is that your company has grabbed a fairly new developer (you) and asked for a setup. One of the requirements for the task should have included experience in C++ if your managers knew anything about MSI setups and custom actions. My reaction to these situations is to point out that building setups is NOT application programming, any more than writing device drivers is, and as a consequence there are some different skills required, one of them being C++ if robust custom actions are expected.
Phil Wilson ________________________________ From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Dhaval Patel Sent: Monday, March 19, 2007 10:45 AM To: Rob Mensching Cc: Joe Kaplan; wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net Subject: Re: [WiX-users] C# .dll "Folks like me," meaning people who have minuscule experience programming in VBScript or C++. I pretty much started learning to program in C# back in 2002, graduated last year, and am currently working as a C#/ASP.NET developer. Of course I could embark on a journey to learn C++, but I think the rest of the world is moving to .NET, especially with the advent of C# 3.0 (LINQ), CLR 3.5, etc. I rather spend time on exploring new features of C# 3.0 and CLR 3.5. I am still a WIX newbie by any means - I hope I didn't offend you by saying 'people like me' :) In essence what I was trying to say is that folks who excel in C# will be able to exploit WIX's features to a greater extent. Plus I think if this happens, many developers will start adopting WIX right away. I still have a few colleagues who don't want to use just because they can't pass values read from a WIX User dialog to a C# .dll. One (hypothetical) example most people would put this functionality to use is writing their own custom SQL connection strings using the SqlConnectionStringBuilder. On 3/19/07, Rob Mensching <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: I haven't blogged it. This one requires more research that my recent "avoid COM advertisement" entry because I haven't lived it closely. I got enough reports of trickiness with managed CustomActions to just stay away. The root issue comes down to having the "wrong" version of the .NET Framework loaded. For example, let's say you have a 1.1 CustomAction but need to install a 2.0 Framework assembly to the GAC. My understanding was that the easy/obvious way to use the 1.1 CustomAction caused the 1.1. Framework to be loaded and that caused the 2.0 Framework install to fail later (because the 1.1. Framework won't understand it). Again, the details are fuzzy because I haven't stepped through the debugger on this issue myself. Basically, it comes down to the fact that the Windows Installer team needs to look at what managed CustomActions mean and do the right thing when looking at the complete picture. They know things about the all the different ways the Windows Installer gets invoked that you and I would struggle to think of. For example, what happens if you had a Shell Extension written in managed code then did faulted in an MSI via Extension advertisement? Do all the correct .NET Frameworks get loaded? Are you going to test it? <smile/> -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ] On Behalf Of Joe Kaplan Sent: Friday, March 16, 2007 11:43 PM To: Rob Mensching; wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net Subject: Re: [WiX-users] C# .dll Hi Rob, Would you care to elaborate on this part a bit? If you already blogged it, I apologize. I've followed the evolution of this issue for a while now and I am always curious to learn more about it. To my knowledge, I don't remember you or anyone else discussing any specific issues regarding loaded the CLR into the installer process. I'm definitely of the opinion that these things are best avoided for now due to the lack of support for it at the WI level. On the other hand, I also believe it is just a matter of time before this needs to happen in a fully supported way. Basically, I'm trying to understand what the solution might look like in order to overcome some of the more subtle issues. What's so "neat"? :) Thanks! Joe K. ----- Original Message ----- From: "Rob Mensching" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Levi Wilson" < [EMAIL PROTECTED]>; "Dhaval Patel" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: < wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net <mailto:wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net> > Sent: Friday, March 16, 2007 12:43 PM Subject: Re: [WiX-users] C# .dll More importantly, the Windows Installer doesn't support it today. There are actually "neat" problems you can introduce by loading the .NET Framework into the Windows Installer process. From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ] On Behalf Of Levi Wilson Sent: Friday, March 16, 2007 10:40 AM To: Dhaval Patel Cc: wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net Subject: Re: [WiX-users] C# .dll I don't know for certain, but my guess would be that there's no guarantee that the .NET Framework has been installed on the client. On 3/16/07, Dhaval Patel < [EMAIL PROTECTED]<mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]>> wrote: Will WIX 3.0 be adding the capability to call C# .dll files? If not, WHY????? :) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ - Take Surveys. Earn Cash. 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