Request: Better requirement management for web media blocks.

[Thona]

I start workingo on an installer, and - I do not like the way prerequisites are packed up into 7zip files per default. It is sort of awkward.

* There should be prepackaged 7zip files available for download, OR a tool that creates them locally, ONCE. Packing them takes tremendous time, at the same time maintaining the "build/do not build" thing manually takes quite some attention. What I would prefer would be a mechanism where you can have all registered ones prepared and then the script just copies them automatically. Or prebuild them and let them download, like Infragistics does. Use a checksum to figure out whether something has changed. At least for repackaged third party tools (dotnet etc.) that should never happen anyway.
* I would love a default setting that I can set on WHERE to download them FROM. I can understand you not having a central download location (unlike Installshield, which do have that), but I would like to maintain one without (!) manually setting the download location again and again on every installer I make. A setting that defins the deffault download location for new elements.
* Last thing, naming. Really, that is another bad thing. Our installers need to work under 8.3 naming file systems. Simple reason: people may want to copy themon a simple FAT formatted medium. I am not talking of the program or something. But why do the different standard 7zuip files not just have 8.3 standard naming extensions. Create them, per default, with 8.3 names and a lot of manual maintenance is gone again.

I really love the repackaging and web block mechanism, but it could need some pretty serious tuning for larger build environments. If you make multiple installers, the steps above would greatly speed up creating and management and would alow for less errors.

[MichaelNesmith]

Hi Thona!

Lots of great posts from you today!

- Your suggestion of a default location is a great idea, as well as defaults for other project fields, such as company information, website, and so on: I am passing this on to the dev team.
- Since Windows 95...FAT has supported long path names. In fact, Windows 9X won't even work without long path names. Also, the FAT32 file system which was introduced with Windows 95B, if memory serves right, provides long file names in addition to optimized cluster sizes, which is a must-have to avoid wasting 40% of disk space on media sizes at and above 2 GB. So I'm really not sure which short file name FAT media still exists in practical use today!

That said, some time saving solutions for you, which save the manual effort:

- Try the Refactor Paths tool. This will automatically extract common paths, including URLs, and update them in a single pass for you with a new value that you provide.
- A Replace tool is available for the setup script - you could replace all .7zip extensions with a .zip extension, or whatever you prefer, again in a single pass.
- The web media blocks visual view lets you toggle the build state of your web media blocks on-off with a single click, so it alleviates the manual management problem.
- Compiler variables can also be used in place of hard coded paths, URLs, etc.
- You may create a new default template for yourself, and use it when creating new projects. You could even have organizational default templates for this purpose, and bundle them on top of an exisiting InstallAware distribution.

To create new default templates, just edit the default template setups found in the InstallAware\\templates folder! You will notice some fields with "funny values" in them, you may want to leave these default as they are populated with the actual project name when the template is
"pushed live" using the New Project window.

Again, many thanks for your great feedback. There definitely are some good global suggestions there, which we'll be using to improve the product.

And for the things which you specifically need: My recommendation would be for you to edit the default project templates and runtime scripts - include your own URLs, company names, download locations, low compressed download files, and so on. You seem to have a set of very well-thought and proven requirements, and the best way to address them would be to build your own corporate templates.

Don't forget to customize the setup themes used in the templates for your own logo and branding and style as well - that's the most fun part Now InstallAware also supports non-rectangular forms and pure bitmap buttons so let your creativity soar. And make us happy by sharing your creations if you feel like it