We always use the binaries zip file for our own use but I recon that the wix36.exe is merely an example of how you can use burn to download msi files with their dependencies/prerequisites. This is good :)
When a development department uses this exe to install their wix stuff I think they are going to get in trouble anyway; I believe that one day the ClickOnce functionality of auto updates (from the web) will reemerge (Would love to use that in my builds :)) Not to mention that the msi files and prerequisites of old versions are no longer available on their original places; WiX nowadays only keeps 3 versions online, as I saw, and Microsoft screws up their servers once and a while, generating those nice messages that the information is moved to some other location, which eventually leads to a 404 message ;) About rebuilding a machine to make an exact rebuild of a particular version which is 5 years old; I've been there several times and it is near to impossible if you don't have snapshots of such machines. The Windows Updates ALLWAYS screw things up; I've been searching for a bug in a 4 year old version for 3 weeks; Not because the bug was hard to find but because a .Net 1.1 security update was triggering issues in that old version of our app.. (I don't go into that ;) ) Best regards, Albert van Peppen Senior System Engineer Insad Grafisch b.v. Mollevite 28 6931 KG Westervoort The Netherlands Phone: *31 (0) 26 319 01 50 Email: alb...@insad.nl Website: www.insad.nl -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- Van: Rob Mensching [mailto:r...@robmensching.com] Verzonden: 06 March 2012 06:36 Aan: General discussion for Windows Installer XML toolset. Onderwerp: Re: [WiX-users] Wow! Dogfooding is very important. It's the way we learn how to do things better than we are doing them now (aka: we make mistakes, get feedback and adjust appropriately). As I noted above, it is pretty clear that we need to focus on improving the /layout experience for the WiX toolset. The WDK did this by incorporating the /layout option into their UI. I expect the answer is for the WiX BA to do the same. Also, I've toyed with putting together a "WiX Toolset Build Machine Edition" Bundle primarily as a way to dogfood the wixstdba. It would target the build machine scenario where you want the minimal pieces installed and you choose your NETFX since WiX command-line tools support NETFX2 or NETFX4. Basically, this would be a lot like the binaries.zip but with automatic MSBuild integration. Anyway, thank you all for feedback. Definitely helps us find the gaps. On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 1:43 PM, Neil Sleightholm <n...@x2systems.com> wrote: > I don't believe there is any value in WiX being a web based install > (other than the very valid point about dog fooding the code). In > addition the new install forces me to install .Net 4.0 just because > the installer needs it; I would like that to be optional as I don't > like polluting build machines with more than it really necessary (I > know I could manually install the files but would rather not). I work > in a company that has very little internet access and have to request > downloads, asking someone to download the exe and then run it with the > /Layout is a pain. > > Neil > > -----Original Message----- > From: Albert van Peppen [mailto:alb...@insad.nl] > Sent: 05 March 2012 16:52 > To: chr...@iswix.com; General discussion for Windows Installer XML > toolset. > Subject: Re: [WiX-users] Wow! > > I agree 100% with this. That is basically why I keep the entire > history of WiX in my repository (diskspace isn't that expensive > nowadays :) ) > > > Best regards, > > Albert van Peppen > Senior System Engineer > > Insad Grafisch b.v. > Mollevite 28 > 6931 KG Westervoort > The Netherlands > > Phone: *31 (0) 26 319 01 50 > Email: alb...@insad.nl > Website: www.insad.nl > > -----Oorspronkelijk bericht----- > Van: Christopher Painter [mailto:chr...@iswix.com] > Verzonden: 05 March 2012 16:49 > Aan: Rob Mensching; General discussion for Windows Installer XML toolset. > Onderwerp: Re: [WiX-users] Wow! > > Rob, > > Regarding /layout, all developers *SHOULD* be doing it despite losing > those "savings". (Assuming any savings is actually realized based on > how many developers are installing the software. ) > > > Anyone involved in the process of developing software ( especially > build and release engineering ) should have mature policies regarding the > ability to track and archive changes to the development environment. If > I have to rebuild a build machine or developer machine I have to be > able go back and reinstall all of the tools exactly the way they were > originally intended. > > > Relying on content for a web-enabled installer to be available 1,5,10 > years down the road ( we still get requests to rebuild VB6 > applications! ) is a horrible practice as the external dependency is > outside of your control. > You must keep your own archive of the tool to ensure the SLA can b met. > Everyone who understands CM should be doing this. > > > Thus /layout is not only an annoyance to me, it's an antipattern. > > > Chris > > ---------------------------------------- > > From: "Rob Mensching" <r...@robmensching.com> > > Sent: Monday, March 05, 2012 9:38 AM > > To: chr...@iswix.com, "General discussion for Windows Installer XML > toolset." <wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net> > > Subject: Re: [WiX-users] Wow! > > > 1. The WiX install *does* chain NETFX 4 in because that is needed > before the WiX BA can show UI (since the WiX BA is written in WPF). > > 2. Dogfooding is the primary reason. > > 3. We save *significant* bandwidth using Burn because during normal > installs it only downloads the portions of the product that you > actually need. > > If *everyone* start using /layout those savings will be lost. <smile/> > > 4. The wixstdba UI is not as functional as we'd like but the web > install experience is significantly better. Click download like, > survive the web browser screening process (this gets better if we can > get WiX signed), click "Run" and in a second the ~500kb exe is > verified and running. Then you have a nice experience while the > process downloads and installs only the parts you need. > > Admittedly, if you want a full layout, then you do "Save" and have to > run another command-line. That scenario is not optimized. > > 5. ISOs are inferior to /layout because they do not get the built-in > robust downloading of Burn. You could use a 3rd party downloader but > that 3rd party download cannot verify the downloaded ISO file the way > Burn will verify and retry each file. > > > We are moving the cheese a little bit here to challenge the status quo > and see if we can't make things better for advanced users and > less-advanced users at the same time. My takeaway is that we may have > deprioritized the /layout scenario too much and should evaluate that > going into the home stretch. > > > > On Mon, Mar 5, 2012 at 7:06 AM, Christopher Painter <chr...@iswix.com> > wrote: > > Other then being allowing WiX to dogfood Burn, what benefit does the > WiX > > installer even gain from using Burn? I thought the old Mondo UI > looked > > just fine and it was a simpler 1 MSI story to boot. My experience with > > the Burn based WiX installers is that user experience is inferior > relative > > to what it was. It doesn't seem like to me that WiX.msi needed any of > the > > capabilities of Burn as it doesn't do things like install the .NET > > framework for you or chain multiple packages together. > > > Personally, I still want my Visual Studio in ISO format and when SP1 > comes > > out I'd appreciate a service release that contains it. I get sick of > > spending 20 minutes to install Visual Studio and 60 minutes to patch it. > > > ---------------------------------------- > > > From: "Bruce Cran" <br...@cran.org.uk> > > > Sent: Monday, March 05, 2012 8:43 AM > > > To: "General discussion for Windows Installer XML toolset." > > <wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net> > > > Subject: Re: [WiX-users] Wow! > > > On 05/03/2012 14:01, keith.doug...@statcan.gc.ca wrote: > > > > The below news is somewhat distressing for those of us who have no > > Internet connection at all on our development workstations and have to > use > > others (non-development machines) to get such access. Is downloading > the > > /layout way and then (say) moving a directory or something going to > work, > > or does /layout change other things (registry)? If it is going to > work, > > will the procedure be well documented? If not, what do you propose > people > > in my sort of situation to do? > > > > > > > > (And if Visual Studio 2011 works either of those ways we're going to > > be > > in a world of hurt here ...) > > > As I understand it, /layout does nothing more than grab a copy of the > > > files for offline use - for example the WDK 8 beta comes as a .zip > that > > > looks like it's been created by running /layout since there's > > > wdksetup.exe and an 'Installers' directory. If you rename the > directory, > > > wdksetup.exe goes online to fetch the files. > > > Of course it doesn't help if you want to do the download using your Mac. > > > -- > > > Bruce Cran > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > ------ > > > -- > > > Try before you buy = See our experts in action! > > > The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft > developers > > > is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus HTML5, CSS3, > MVC3, > > > Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you subscribe now! > > > http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-dev2 > > > _______________________________________________ > > > WiX-users mailing list > > > WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net > > > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > ------ > -- > > Try before you buy = See our experts in action! > > The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft > developers > > is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus HTML5, CSS3, > MVC3, > > Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you subscribe now! > > http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-dev2 > > _______________________________________________ > > WiX-users mailing list > > WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net > > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users > > > -- > > virtually, Rob Mensching - http://RobMensching.com LLC > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > -------- Try before you buy = See our experts in action! > The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft > developers is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus > HTML5, CSS3, MVC3, Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you > subscribe now! > http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-dev2 > _______________________________________________ > WiX-users mailing list > WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > -------- Try before you buy = See our experts in action! > The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft > developers is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus > HTML5, CSS3, MVC3, Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you > subscribe now! > http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-dev2 > _______________________________________________ > WiX-users mailing list > WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users > > > > > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > -------- Try before you buy = See our experts in action! > The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft > developers is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus > HTML5, CSS3, MVC3, Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you > subscribe now! > http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-dev2 > _______________________________________________ > WiX-users mailing list > WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users > -- virtually, Rob Mensching - http://RobMensching.com LLC ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Keep Your Developer Skills Current with LearnDevNow! The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft developers is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus HTML5, CSS3, MVC3, Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you subscribe now! http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-d2d _______________________________________________ WiX-users mailing list WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Keep Your Developer Skills Current with LearnDevNow! The most comprehensive online learning library for Microsoft developers is just $99.99! Visual Studio, SharePoint, SQL - plus HTML5, CSS3, MVC3, Metro Style Apps, more. Free future releases when you subscribe now! http://p.sf.net/sfu/learndevnow-d2d _______________________________________________ WiX-users mailing list WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users
