Visual Studio Setup

Installation and containerization of the Visual Studio family of products

2007 - Page 2 of 6 - Visual Studio Setup

ResolveSource Requires Source

October 25, 2007 Oct 25, 2007 10/25/07
Heath Stewart
It might be tempting to schedule the ResolveSource action, but ResolveSource actually requires that the original installation source is available whenever it is called. If your installer package is authored correctly, source must only be resolve in cases where the original RTM files are missing or during some patch uninstall scenarios. To ...

EXE Custom Actions are Bad

October 24, 2007 Oct 24, 2007 10/24/07
Heath Stewart
Windows Installer custom actions that launch executables (base custom action type msidbCustomActionTypeExe, 0x2) are typically bad and should be avoided. How are they bad? Let the Windows Installer team count the ways.During internal audits we question any EXE custom actions (CAs) but inevitably some make it into the product. Typically these ...

Progress for New Patches

October 18, 2007 Oct 18, 2007 10/18/07
Heath Stewart
You asked. We answered. One source of problems for Visual Studio 2005 Service Pack 1 was that VS 2005 SP1 targeted multiple products, and if you had multiple target products installed - most commonly Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 that uses our IDE - multiple instances of dialogs would spawn. Some people thought SP1 was installing ...

Detection Logic fixed for KB937061 (MS07-052)

September 14, 2007 Sep 14, 2007 09/14/07
Heath Stewart
Customers have been offered KB937061 for Visual Studio 2005 Service Pack 1 from Microsoft Update when they have already installed it. The Microsoft Security Response Center blog has more information about the problem and what they have done to fix it.I wanted to add that because patches are cached according to their package code, you do not ...

Transform Validation in WiX Patch Build

September 13, 2007 Sep 13, 2007 09/13/07
Heath Stewart
In the latest WiX v3 drops a new element is supported to configure transform validation bits. The default is still 0x0922001f but you can now configure them. Torch.exe was also modified to accept transform validation bits using the same flags as msitran.exe in the Windows Installer SDK, as well as transform types that group together common ...

Column Types Cannot be Changed in a Patch or Transform

September 1, 2007 Sep 1, 2007 09/1/07
Heath Stewart
Transforms can change just about anything in an installation package - even the code page. Transforms can also add and drop both tables and columns but they cannot, however, change the column type. This is true for patches as well, since a patch package contains transforms.At their core, transforms store data aligned to the size of the data ...

Upload Installation Logs on Vista Today

August 28, 2007 Aug 28, 2007 08/28/07
Heath Stewart
Bret Grinslade, Group Program Manager for our Deployment Technology Group, describes how you can send feedback directly to our team. You can also check a box during setup to have feedback in the form of installation logs sent directly to our system. As Bret notes, however, on Vista uploading logs can take up to 30 days before you're prompted ...

Windows Installer 4.5 Beta Available

August 25, 2007 Aug 25, 2007 08/25/07
Heath Stewart
Windows Installer 4.5 Beta is now available to those signed up through Connect. Along with the whitepapers posted earlier, binaries for x86, x64, and IA64; headers; and libraries are all available.Expect to see more technical details on individual Windows Installer 4.5 features in the weeks to come...

Performance Issue to be Addressed in .NET 3.5

August 14, 2007 Aug 14, 2007 08/14/07
Heath Stewart
Current .NET Framework patches may not NGEN some assemblies as was recently discovered for KB928365. We have worked out a solution and Surupa Biswas, a PM on the CLR team, wanted me to pass along the following information. As indicated in this post, an update to the CLR or to just the Framework 2.0 assemblies can leave applications based on ...