Rambling out loud here, hope this helps some. The problem you will run into is today bundles are seen as a single install. If a user installs your first bundle "instance" and then wants to install a second the UX would be confusing because it wouldn't come up as an install but rather a modify/repair/remove dialog. It would also get crazy complicated when you start to think about upgrades. Should it only upgrade one instance or all of them? How is the engine supposed to know?
My compromise was to have a Bundle per MSI, not utilizing instance transforms, and share the common CABS. As for the complexities of instance transforms, if you had a finite list of transforms then in theory you could modify burn (and candle/light) to be able to harvest all the Upgrade/Product codes post transform during the compile/link stage. This is needed for input to the detect phase, as the bundle may not have the MSI available until apply is called. Even more so, you wouldn't want to be forced to spin up Windows Installer to apply the transform at runtime, because Windows Installer may be a prerequisite in the bundle. The reason for not implementing instance transform support in burn thus far is they are seen as a niche market (they are very complex/difficult to get right). I'm not saying it couldn't be done, but rather there are many more interesting features and bugs that will get done first. Wix is an open source project, so the enhancements made to it are done by the community (typically because that consumer needed the functionality). -----Original Message----- From: tyler.w.r...@accenture.com [mailto:tyler.w.r...@accenture.com] Sent: Friday, November 15, 2013 7:18 AM To: wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net Subject: Re: [WiX-users] Burn Multi-Instance Installs with Multiple I understand that Burn does not support multi-instance transforms atm. I was referring to what Jacob Hoover said quoted below: "Is there a reason you are using instance transforms instead of multiple MSI's? I started with instance transforms (and contributed some changes for them) but have since backed away and I am generating individual MSI's for each. I use external CAB's, so there is no duplicated data files, just the slight bloat of having a MSI per instance." The above is what I am curious about. Does burn conditionally install one of the MSI's depending on a condition? How does upgrades work with the above etc? I would be interested in doing this over the way we are currently doing it because if upgrades work smoothly then I think this will be a cleaner approach than what we currently do. Message: 1 Date: Thu, 14 Nov 2013 22:11:15 +0000 From: Rob Mensching <r...@robmensching.com<mailto:r...@robmensching.com>> Subject: Re: [WiX-users] Burn Multi-Instance Installs with Multiple MSI's To: General discussion about the WiX toolset. <wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net<mailto:wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net>> Message-ID: <f5566aa42c2f4fc7b21bc8a44f187...@bn1pr07mb181.namprd07.prod.outlook.com<mailto:f5566aa42c2f4fc7b21bc8a44f187...@bn1pr07mb181.namprd07.prod.outlook.com>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" There is a feature request to support multi-instance transforms in Burn. Not implemented yet. -----Original Message----- From: tyler.w.r...@accenture.com<mailto:tyler.w.r...@accenture.com> [mailto:tyler.w.r...@accenture.com] Sent: Thursday, November 14, 2013 1:31 PM To: wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net<mailto:wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net> Subject: [WiX-users] Burn Multi-Instance Installs with Multiple MSI's Hello, I was doing some googling and found an archived mailing list talking about doing Multi Instance installs with external CABs and multiple MSI's. Could someone elaborate on this a little more like how to handle selecting the correct MSI from Burn etc? Below is the link to the conversation I am asking about. http://windows-installer-xml-wix-toolset.687559.n2.nabble.com/Multiple-Instances-amp-Burn-Bootstrapper-td7586370.html Tyler Reid | Operations and Infrastructure | Accenture Software | P&C Insurance 1807 Jones Street | Bolivar, MO 65613| USA Office: +cc.xxx.xxx.xxxx | Fax: 417.777.3792 E-Mail: tyler.w.r...@accenture.com<mailto:tyler.w.r...@accenture.com<mailto:tyler.w.r...@accenture.com%3cmailto:tyler.w.r...@accenture.com>> | www.accenture.com/pcsoftware<http://www.accenture.com/pcsoftware<http://www.accenture.com/pcsoftware%3chttp:/www.accenture.com/pcsoftware>> ________________________________ This message is for the designated recipient only and may contain privileged, proprietary, or otherwise confidential information. If you have received it in error, please notify the sender immediately and delete the original. Any other use of the e-mail by you is prohibited. Where allowed by local law, electronic communications with Accenture and its affiliates, including e-mail and instant messaging (including content), may be scanned by our systems for the purposes of information security and assessment of internal compliance with Accenture policy. ______________________________________________________________________________________ www.accenture.com ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ DreamFactory - Open Source REST & JSON Services for HTML5 & Native Apps OAuth, Users, Roles, SQL, NoSQL, BLOB Storage and External API Access Free app hosting. Or install the open source package on any LAMP server. Sign up and see examples for AngularJS, jQuery, Sencha Touch and Native! http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=63469471&iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk _______________________________________________ WiX-users mailing list WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ DreamFactory - Open Source REST & JSON Services for HTML5 & Native Apps OAuth, Users, Roles, SQL, NoSQL, BLOB Storage and External API Access Free app hosting. Or install the open source package on any LAMP server. Sign up and see examples for AngularJS, jQuery, Sencha Touch and Native! http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=63469471&iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk _______________________________________________ WiX-users mailing list WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users
