9 replies to this topic

[probsar]

Hi,
I have a IS6.3 Installation-Routine, which I use for fresh Installs, Updates and Maintenance Tasks - all in one.
Most of the Events are caught and proceeded by hand, so I really control them

Now I'd like to add an additional functionality with silent mode setup, to ease the remote distribution for our FE's.
For that I have generated a *.iss file with "setup.exe -r". Within this process I recognized that each single 'Action' is listened in numeric order from 0 to X. (e.g. Dlg1, Dlg2, ... and beneath the encoding [{ProductGUID}-SdShowDlgEdit3-0] Part of the .iss files)

Now my problem is that the different installation processes (fresh, Maintenance and Update) also have different .iss files (different sequences for the same dialogs). E.g. the Dialogs of Licensing and User Information's and so on will not be displayed in maintenance or update mode but different additional dialogs might appear instead (maintenance dialog) instead of those.
This means I would have to provide a own .iss file for each possible run-through (about 12) of the setup. This is not acceptable for maintaining and distributing the Installer to be used by our FE's.

How can I produce and USE a generally valid .iss file for this kind of installation type???

Thanks for your help

[Taco Bell]

IS will ignore any extra dialog entries, so I'd suggest trying to combine all of the unique information into one super, all-inclusive ISS file.  Good luck!

[probsar]

But the entries are not the same for DLG0 in a fresh Installation and in a Maintenace Installation!

e.G. The first Dialog in a fresh installation will be the language selection - diplayed in the iss file as DLG0-1

The first Dialog in a Maintenace installation could be the Maintenace Dialog or the Update Dialog, according what happend before - displayed in the iss file also as DLG0-1

but with different content and Type

[probsar]

Thanks anyway TaccoBell

[Taco Bell]

Yes I know.  That's fine as it's just a numeric identifier.  As you found, they are simply listed in numeric order.

What I'm saying is take the unique dialogs found in the three existing ISS files and put them into a new common ISS file.  Then renumber the dialogs, so that they are unique (i.e. Dlg0 from full becomes Dlg1, Dlg0 from update becomes Dlg2, Dlg0 from maintenance becomes Dlg3).  As I stated, IS will ignore any extras.  Now repeat that process for the next set of dialogs (full's Dlg1 becomes Dlg4, etc.), and so on.

Having done all that, you'll have a new super ISS file which should work for all three cases.

However, maintaining this thing for future releases will be bitch (excuse my French), and I don't think the ISS file has syntax for comments, but if it does, make use of it!

[probsar]

Curious, but it really seam to work -  

execpting one thing:
I have a Language Selction Dialog at the beginning of the setup, which does not only choose the Language displayed during the setup, but also sets the Language of my Program installed.
We support German, English and Italian this time. And the installed software is not depending on the language of the OS but on the selection of the Language Dialog at the beginning.

Now IS allways uses the OS Language settings as the installation option of the Software to be installed!

Does anybody have a clue how I can avoid that, or how to set the language by the silent file (setup.Iss)???


Thanks

[Taco Bell]

Yes, I knew it would probsar.  You got too hung up on the meaning of the dialog IDs and consequently gave up too quickly.  

However, I have no idea how to solve your new problem as I've fortunately never had to deal with a multi-language install.  Also, this issue would probaby have been better suited to a new topic since it's indeed a different question, but too late for that.  Oh well.

[PeterFlickinger]

Taco Bell.
Do you know of any InstallShield info doc that specifies that IS ignores extra dialog entries?
I would assume that you could use that technique to handle both SdFinish and SdFinishReboot then??
Thanks.
Peter

[Taco Bell]

@PeterFlickinger: I don't know if it's documented, but ignoring the extra dialogs has been my experience with silent IS6 setups.

However, I know that's not true with all of the earlier versions of InstallShield.

Edited by Taco Bell, 02 May 2005 - 23:59.

[PeterFlickinger]

Cool.
Thanks for the reply "Taco Bell".
That seems to be what rings true for InstallShield. A lot of specifics to how things work is not documented - you figure it out by playing around or finding it on a forum.
thanks again.