1 reply to this topic

[Glytzhkof]

I have a requirement from web-farm administrators to provide a detailed report of what changes an MSI made to the system. I know I could use a verbose log file and the wilogutl.exe tool, but this does not quite give them what they want.

What tools are available to generate an MSI installation report listing files installed to what location, registry keys changed etc...? I know the MakeMSI tool has a good reporting feature, but it doesn't seem to be available for MSI files not generated with the tool itself.

I already found the AeBuildPackageReport.exe tool on installsite.org, and it is good, but does not provide registry information.

[VBScab]

FWIW, the reports from Wise Package Studio are useless, in that they occasionally mis-report file size, date and/or version.

Even so, getting a report from the MSI itself may not be much use because, of course, not all features may necessarily be installed each time.

TBH, I'd script it. That way, you get to include exactly what detail and in what format you want. You'd need to get the product code and then use the packed version of that to get the list of features installed, then the components and THEN interrogate the MSI for those details and compare them against what exists on the machine. The comparison part is a belt-and-braces, can-we-be-sure-all-the-components-are-present approach and may be a step too far for your first version.

Check your PMs.

Edited by VBScab, 22 July 2008 - 09:01.