Stand alone build

[seanmckenna]

Does InstallAware have a stand alone build module? I know that I can use miabuild.exe to build from the command line, but does this require the whole application to be installed?

A second question is what if I am using a plug-in (such as the Eval Plugin) in my project. Do I need to make sure this plugin exists on my buildmachine too? I assume that I would, but I'm not sure how this works.

I would like to to builds on a build machine, without the need to install InstallAware. Thanks

[MichaelNesmith]

Hi Sean,

The easiest way for you to do builds on a remote machine will be by installing InstallAware, along with the plug-ins required by your project, on the build machine. You may then run the license tool to activate this copy of InstallAware - this will NOT violate your license agreement or terms of purchase as long as you only use the command line build module (provided you have purchased at least the Studio edition, which lets you redistribute miabuild.exe).

Alternately, you may manually copy the files required by miabuild, along with miabuild itself, and copy the plug-in files and create their registry entries as well. The full list of files required for support is covered in the help topic "Runtime Files".

[seanmckenna]

Thats what I was afraid of. Installing more software onto our build machine is not really ideal, but I guess we can deal with it.

I was really hoping I could just copy a group of files onto the machine and run them. This way if we update InstallAware, I only need to checkin some new files, not install a whole new product.

What do you think if I dynamically created the registry entries? I could keep the files in source control, and just create the keys on the fly. This might solve my problem. Do you have any idea if the reg keys would change between versions?

[MichaelNesmith]

I'm not sure what you mean by dynamically creating registry entries. If you do not want to install software on your build machine, you may certainly copy files over and create registry keys manually. The paths in the registry are available in the product help file under the Plug-Ins book.

[seanmckenna]

Michael, what I really want is a group of files I can check into source control so that all I need to do to build my setup is get latest of this folder.

InstallShield has this, which is what we used before InstallAware. We like to keep our build machines very light in terms of installed software so that its not a huge pain to set up a new build machine.

It turns out when I only install the options I need, its only about 30MB, which is pretty good. I'm going to install it on the server for now. It would be great if you guys had a stand alone module for commandline builds in the future, though.

Thanks!

[MichaelNesmith]

Hi Sean,

I see where you're coming from. Well, what you can do is indeed check-in those files into your source control, and that's about it! As long as you create the registry entries (could be another .REG file in source control), you'll be set. Its not really complicated, given your requirements. I just thought it'd be easier for you to install directly, that's all.