InstallSite Blog : InstallShield

Visual Studio 2010 Beta 2 includes link to InstallShield Limited Edition

stefan — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 09:02:26 GMT

Some beta testers of Visual Studio 2010 pointed out that in the New Project dialog there is a new template called "InstallShield 2010". It's listed next to "Visual Studio Installer" under Other Project Types > Setup and Deployment. It's not a real template but only a button labeled "Enable InstallShield Limited Edition" as you can see in the screenshot from the Professional edition of Visual studio 2010 Beta 2:

Clicking this button takes you to another page with some explanation what InstallShield Limited Edition for Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 is, and a button "Go to InstallShield". However the link behind this button isn't (yet?) working, it redirects to the Microsoft homepage.

So it looks like Microsoft and Flexera Software are extending their cooperation to make a limited edition of InstallShield available to Visual Studio users. Users of Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager (SCCM) can already get a limited edition of Flexera Software's AdminStudio at no additional cost.

There is currently no information about the capabilities and limitations of this edition of InstallShield.

While it's good to see that Microsoft is going to offer Visual Studio users an alternative to Visual Studio Installer projects (which are still available) to create Windows Installer (MSI) setups, I'm still sad that they decided not to include the Windows Installer XML toolkit (WiX) with Visual Studio 2010, as they had planned previously. And since Visual Studio 2010 is still in beta, they could even decide not to include InstallShield either.

Speaking of WiX - the WiX toolset now supports Visual Studio 2010 Beta2:

Related information:

Application Virtualization for Developers - Webinar by Flexera Software

stefan — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 07:13:59 GMT

I'm looking forward to this webinar because it's going to discuss a question that I'm also asking myself these days: "Is application virtualization the future of software installations?". Of course, the final answer will be "InstallShield" because it supports Microsoft App-V and it's the product that Flexera Software wants to sell. But I hope they'll cover some interesting points along the way. Some bullet points about the content of the webinar:

Why software developers are delivering applications in virtual formats
Best practices for developing a virtual version of an application
How to simultaneously build a MSI setup and Microsoft App-V™ virtual package with InstallShield

The webinar will be held twice on Thursday, November 5, 2009, at two different times to accommodate time zones.

First webinar: 15:00 UTC = 9am CT / 10am ET / 3pm London / 16:00 Germany / other time zones
Second webinar: 19:00 UTC = 11am PT / 2pm ET / 7pm London / 20:00 Germany / other time zones

Caveat: Registration required. Be careful with the information you enter in the registration form, because anyone who knows your e-mail address will be able to retrieve it. This includes your full name, phone number and the like.

Registration page

Acresso changes name to Flexera

stefan — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 16:32:00 GMT

Mark Bishof, President and CEO of Acresso Software, today informed customers that the company will change its name to Flexera Software effective October 12, 2009. They plan to issue a formal press announcement about this on October 13. But in his e-mail he already hinted about the reason:

"Under the new corporate brand, Flexera Software, we can fully market, service, and support our products in all geographies where we do business today and where we plan to over the coming years."

So maybe the word "Acresso" has some negative connotations in some language or country, or maybe there were legal or trademark issues.

However, according to the e-mail, "this corporate branding change should be transparent" to customers, and except the name nothing will change.

This is the second name change for the maker of the InstallShield, InstallAnywhere, AdminStudio and FLEXnet product families within 19 months. Here's a brief history:

In July 2004 Macrovision Corp., makers of FLEXnet and multimedia copy protection products, acquired InstallShield Software Corp., makers of InstallShield and AdminStudio.
In June 2005 Macrovision also acquired InstallShield's former competitor, Zero G Software, Inc., makers of InstallAnywhere.
In April 2008, Macrovision's software business unit was sold to private equity firm Thoma Bravo under the name Acresso Software.
On October 13, 2009 Acresso Software will be renamed to Flexera Software.

By the way: In July 2009 the remaining Macrovision Corp. was renamed to rovi Corporation.

Service Pack 1 for InstallShield 2010 brings support for the final released versions of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2

stefan — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 18:17:02 GMT

When InstallShield 2010 was released, Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 were still in the Release Candidate (RC) state. Acresso now published Service Pack 1 to support the release versions (RTM) of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, and the included MSI 5 engine. SP1 also includes some enhancements for Windows Mobile installations and for Microsoft's App-V application virtualization.

Caveat: SP1 adds additional tables to the project file. When you open a project file in InstallShield 2010 SP1 it will be converted to the new format. Thereafter it can no longer be opened in InstallShield 2010 without SP1. So if you are working in a team, make sure that all users install SP1 simultaneously.

The stand-alone build engine has also been updated and can be downloaded as a full install package (not a patch).

Enhancements in SP1 related to Windows Installer 5 and Windows 7/Server 2008 R2 include:

Improved manifest for setup.exe to avoid triggering the program compatibility assistant on Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2
New options for Windows Services
Setting shell properties for shortcuts
Windows 7 Logo validation

Enhanced support for Microsoft App-V (requires Virtualization Pack):

Create App-V package upgrades
Compress App-V packages

Enhancements related to Windows Mobile 6.5:

Specify a 90x90 .png shortcut Icon for the Start Screen on Windows Mobile 6.5 Professional, which is a requirement for the Windows Marketplace for Mobile

SP1 also includes a number of bug fixes.

For detailed information see the release notes:

To download SP1 select Check for Updates from the Tools menu in InstallShield. See also knowledge base article Q206429

Careful with that Hyperlink (on your MSI dialog)

stefan — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 19:51:16 GMT

One of the new features in version 5 of the Windows Installer runtime is support for hyperlink controls on setup dialogs. Remember that MSI 5 is only available on Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, but there's no redistributable for down-level platforms.

In most cases when introducing new features, the MSI team made sure they don't break your setup on older runtime versions. For instance, older MSI versions simply ignore new tables that they can't use. This enables developers to create a setup that will run with basic functionality on older platforms but on the latest MSI version the new features would "light up".

The hyperlink control is different, maybe because it's not a table but a new control type in an existing table, the Control table. Thus, it causes your setup to fail on Windows Installer versions prior to MSI 5:

Dialog with hyperlink control on Windows 7

Dialog with hyperlink control on Windows Vista

Error code 2885 means "Failed to create the control [3] on the dialog [2]."

Workaround

To work around this issue, create two versions of the dialog, one with the hyperlink control, and the other without. Use these condition to display the appropriate dialog:

VersionMsi >= "5.00" (for the dialog with hyperlink control)
VersionMsi < "5.00" (for the dialog without hyperlink control)

Note that making the hyperlink control invisible for MSI versions < 5 doesn't help. You really need a separate dialog.

How to create a hyperlink control (if your tool doesn't support it)

I've used Advanced Installer to create the above screen shots, because its dialog editor can create hyperlink controls. If you are using InstallShield or another tool that doesn't support hyperlink controls (yet) but has a way to modify the msi tables directly, you can create a hyperlink control using these easy steps:

Create a static text control
Set its text in HTML format: like this:
<a href=http://www.installsite.org>www.InstallSite.org</a>
where the href parameter specifies the URL and the text between the opening and the closing tag is what gets displayed.
Go to Direct Editor and select the table named Control.
Find your text control and change the Type from Text to Hyperlink.

This manual procedure even gives you more flexibility. For instance you could hyperlink only part of the text, while in Advanced Installer the complete text is hyperlinked. The following screen shot was created with InstallShield using this string for the Hyperlink Text:

Please visit <a href="http://www.installsite.org">InstallSite.org</a> for more samples

InstallShield 2010 Released

stefan — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 11:55:14 GMT

(Updated to fix broken hyperlinks)

On October 18, 2009 Acresso released the latest version of their setup authoring tool InstallShield, which reportedly is used by over 71,000 ISVs and enterprises to create installers for Windows and mobile devices.

What's new in InstallShield 2010

Supports Microsoft App-V with new InstallShield Virtualization Pack - in addition to Windows Installer (MSI) and proprietary InstallScripts, developers can now create virtual application packages for Microsoft App-V (formerly Softgrid)
New Microsoft technologies supported natively in InstallShield – InstallShield 2010 supports Windows 7 and MSI 5 features so developers can use them now on Windows XP and Vista platforms. It also has support for Windows Server 2008 R2.
Improved support for Web applications – Expanded IIS features now include all IIS 7 settings.
IDE usability improvements – New flattened architecture and dynamic and global searching significantly increase developer productivity. Developers can spend 10 minutes to learn the new IDE and then benefit from significant time saved on daily tasks.
More options for runtime user-experience customization – ISVs have more customization options to create user experience and branding with new support for billboards, Flash, HTML, and hyperlinks. New branding options can help ISVs up/cross-sell their software by adding more user interaction through the installation process.
Better support for multi-language installation – InstallShield now supports Unicode. Also developers will save significant time by having a single view of all languages with dynamic searching and replacing global settings at once.
plus over 400 new and enhanced features from customer requests

Detailed information can be found in the datasheet and in the release notes:

If you’re in Europe you can buy InstallShield 2010 from the InstallSite Shop.

Changes in Activation Process and EULA

Changes in the End User License Agreement (EULA) and in the activation process include:

Licenses can now be “de-activated” manually, even offline.
Activation needs to be repeated on a yearly basis.
Using InstallShield in a virtual machine is now allowed.

I have created a side-by-side comparison of the old and the new EULA and a summary of the changes in the activation process. For full details please read Acresso’s official documents:

InstallShield 2010 EULA (PDF)
InstallShield Activation User Guide (PDF)

End of Life announced for InstallShield 12 and InstallAnywhere 8

Together with the release of InstallShield 2010 Acresso also announced the end of life for InstallShield 12 and InstallAnywhere 8 (all language editions). This means that you can upgrade from these versions only until October 30, 2009. After that date you would have to pay the full license price.

October 31, 2009 is the deadline for the following product versions:

InstallShield 12 (all languages)
InstallShield 2008 German
InstallShield 2009 German
InstallAnywhere 8 (all languages)
InstallAnywhere 2008 (German and French)
InstallAnywhere 2009 (German and French)

The end of life for the localized German versions of InstallShield and the German and French versions of InstallAnywhere had already been announced two weeks ago.
The English versions of InstallShield 2008 and higher and InstallAnywhere 2008 and higher are not affected by this announcement.

More information about these end of life announcements can be found in the InstallSite Shop and the Acresso Website.

End of Life for InstallShield German announced

stefan — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 11:33:19 GMT

Today Acresso announced the end of life for the German editions of InstallShield and for the German and French editions of InstallAnywhere.

There will be no German edition of InstallShield 2010, and upgrade pricing from the German to the English edition will end on October 31, 2009.

Here are the official announcements:

Additional information in German language:

Acresso Software, der Hersteller von InstallShield, hat bekannt gegeben, dass die deutsche Edition der InstallShield-Produktfamilie nicht fortgeführt wird. Somit sind InstallShield 2009 Premier, Professional und Express die letzten InstallShield-Produkte in deutscher Sprache. Ab InstallShield 2010 wird es die Software nur noch auf Englisch (und Japanisch) geben.

Bis 31.10.2009 gibt es einen Sonder-Rabatt beim Umstieg von der deutschen auf die englische Version. Danach ist kein Upgrade von der deutschen Version mehr möglich, d.h. ab 1.11.2009 muss der Preis der Vollversion bezahlt werden..

Hier habe ich einige Informationen für Besitzer und Interessenten von InstallShield German mit oder ohne Wartungsvertrag zusammengestellt:
http://www.installsite.biz/de/ix_ger_eol.htm

Ebenfalls betroffen ist InstallAnywhere, wo die deutsche und die französische Version eingestellt wird. Auch hier endet die Upgrade-Berechtigung am 31.10.2009.

30% Discount off InstallShield and InstallAnywhere Upgrades through April

stefan — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 15:22:19 GMT

For a limited time you can save 30% when upgrading to the latest versions of InstallShield or InstallAnywhere.

This offer is valid for upgrades from InstallShield 12 or InstallShield 2008 to InstallShield 2009 and from InstallAnywhere 8, InstallAnywhere 2008 or InstallAnywhere 2008 Value Pack 1 to InstallAnywhere 2009.

In addition to pure upgrades the offer is also valid for upgrades bundled with a maintenance plan. (It is not valid for full products, maintenance renewals or end-of-live products.)

This special offer runs until April 30, 2009.

You can buy InstallShield and InstallAnywhere from the InstallSite Shop

Chaining MSI Packages with MSI 4.5 White Paper

stefan — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 14:19:26 GMT

David Cole, Senior Software Engineer and Install Architect at IBM, has written a white paper called “Using Chained .MSI Packages to Componentize Your Windows Installer Setup”. The white paper is available from Acresso Software, the makers of InstallShield, but most of the content is independent of the tool used to create the setup.

David doesn’t simply reiterate the documentation from Microsoft or Acresso regarding the chaining features that were introduced with Windows Installer 4.5. Instead he collected information about best practices, pitfalls and limitations from sources such as blogs, web sites, community discussions etc. The result is a very useful document that anyone who considers building chained MSI packages should read.

Download the white paper from Acresso (registration required)

WARNING: Anyone who knows your e-mail address can retrieve the information you entered during registration, so be careful what you enter as address, phone number, company revenue, etc.

Acresso Special Offers in October

stefan — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 13:14:15 GMT

Acresso has started a new special offer for InstallShield and InstallAnywhere for October, and the AdminStudio offer also runs through Oct 30. Below is a summary of the current offers, and also some information about the price increase that was announced for November 1, 2008.

InstallShield and InstallAnywhere offer

"No-Cost Upgrade: Get the latest InstallShield or InstallAnywhere at no charge" is the subject line of an e-mailing that Acresso is currently sending to customers. While I find this slightly exaggerated :) you can still save a significant amount of money using this offer. And by the way: you can use it even if you didn't receive the e-mail. Here is how it works:

You order*: Bundle Product Upgrade + Silver Maintenance
You pay: Silver Maintenance only (which is less than a single upgrade)
You get: Upgrade to the current version + free product upgrades for the next 12 months + unlimited phone and web support for 12 months

This offer is valid for supported as well as end-of-life versions of InstallShield and InstallAnywhere (but you can't switch to a higher edition, for example from Professional to Premier).

*special promotion code required, contact your reseller for details

Example 1: Upgrade from InstallShield 11 Professional

Suppose you have InstallShield 11 Professional, which is a currently supported version (support for this version will end December 31, 2008, but that's another story) and want to upgrade to InstallShield 2009 Professional.

Regular upgrade price (without maintenance)	799 €
Regular price for upgrade + silver maintenance	1,519 €
Special offer price for upgrade + silver maintenance	709 €

So you pay less than the regular upgrade price but also get a silver maintenance plan, which includes upgrades and support for one year.

Example 2: Upgrade from InstallShield 10.5 Professional

Suppose you have InstallShield 10.5 Professional, which is no longer supported (so you cannot upgrade but would have to buy the full product) and want to upgrade to InstallShield 2009 Professional.

Regular full product price (without maintenance)	1,609 €
Regular price for full product + silver maintenance	2,229 €
Special offer price for upgrade + silver maintenance	709 €

This offer is valid through October 31, 2008. The prices used in the above examples are the list prices valid in October 2008. See below for the price increase announced for November.

AdminStudio offer

When upgrading from a supported version of AdminStudio (version 7.0 or higher) to AdminStudio 9 you can get 10% off the upgrade price. Owners of end-of-life versions (AdminStudio 6 or older) can get 30% off the price of the full version. Don't be confused: owners of a current version get 10% discount in addition to the regular upgrade discount, owners of end-of-life versions get 30% off the price of the full product (not off the upgrade price). This offer is valid through October 31, 2008.

InstallShield Multiplatform and Universal offer

Users of InstallShield Multiplatform or the Universal project type in InstallShield to create cross-platform installations can migrate to InstallAnywhere with 30%-50% off the software price and a 15% discount for consulting and training. This offer is valid through December 19, 2008.

InstallShield and InstallAnywhere price increase effective Nov 1

Acresso announced that the prices for InstallShield and InstallAnywhere will be significantly increased effective November 1, 2008. I don't have a full price list but from what I've seen so far:

Prices for full products will go up 10%-20%
Prices for upgrades will go up 50%-70%, in some cases they will even double
Prices for maintenance will not change (except InstallShield Premier Silver Maintenance which will go up 10%)

Note that these are only ballpark numbers and subject to change.

Call to action

If you have an end-of-life version (InstallShield 10.5 or older, or InstallAnywhere 6 or older, or AdminStudio 6 or older) you can get the latest version at a relatively low price through October 31.

If you have a supported version of InstallShield (versions 11 - 2008) or InstallAnywhere (versions 7 - 2008 without VP1) you can lock in the pricing for one year by taking advantage of the upgrade + maintenance bundle offers. Note that InstallAnywhere 2008 was released about a year ago, so I'd expect a new version in the near future - which you would get free of charge as a benefit of your maintenance plan.

This article is only a broad overview. Please contact your reseller to find out if/how you can benefit from these offers and which promo code to use.

These products and special offers are also available from InstallSite.

InstallShield and InstallAnywhere prices will go up

stefan — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 08:52:45 GMT

In an e-mail sent today, Acresso announced that effective November 1, 2008, prices will increase on InstallShield® and InstallAnywhere®. There were no details in the e-mail, but according to my information the prices for full versions and upgrades of InstallShield and InstallAnywhere will go up substantially.

So if you plan to buy InstallShield or InstallAnywhere or upgrade to the latest version, you should do so before November 1, 2008. Note that until September 30, 2008 there are extra discounts available for some upgrades and end-of-life special offers.

You can buy InstallShield and InstallAnywhere in the InstallSite Shop

Additional upgrade discounts from Acresso, including end-of-life products

stefan — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 22:03:57 GMT

Today Acresso extended the upgrade discount offer (10% off the upgrade price) that is available through the end of September (for AdminStudio: end of October) to the following product versions:

InstallShield Express: versions 11, 11.5, 12, 2008
InstallShield Professional and Premier: versions 11, 11.5
InstallAnywhere Standard and Enterprise: version 7.0
AdminStudio Standard, Professional and Enterprise: versions 7.x, 8.x

In addition, owners of old InstallShield, InstallAnywhere and AdminStudio versions that are past end-of-life and no longer qualify for upgrade pricing can get 30% off the price of the full product during the same time period.

Please contact your preferred reseller for the appropriate discount codes.

You can buy InstallShield, InstallAnywhere and AdminStudio in the InstallSite Shop

Acresso announces end of life for InstallShield 11.x and InstallAnywhere 7, special upgrade discount offer

stefan — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 22:16:19 GMT

On August 27, 2008, Acresso announced the end of life of InstallShield 11 and 11.5. This includes Premier, Professional and Express Editions and all languages of these Editions. Acresso also announced the end of life of InstallAnywhere 7.x.

To stay current with the latest Acresso release, InstallShield 11.x and InstallAnywhere 7.x users can purchase the latest version of InstallShield (for Windows support) or InstallAnywhere (for multiplatform support) - depending on their existing version and edition - at the upgrade price through December 31, 2008. After December 31, 2008, they will need to purchase a new license of the latest version of InstallShield or InstallAnywhere at the regular full license price in order to stay current.

Special upgrade discount through September 30, 2008

Customers who want to upgrade from InstallShield 11.x or InstallAnywhere 7.x to the latest version can get an extra 10% discount off of the upgrade price when ordering before September 30, 2008 (please contact your preferred reseller for discount code).

You can buy InstallShield and InstallAnywhere in the InstallSite Shop

InstallShield 2009 Express available

stefan — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 22:00:20 GMT

On August 27, 2008 Acresso released version 2009 of InstallShield Express, completing the InstallShield 2009 product family: Premier, Professional and Express.

New features in this version include:

Setup Prerequisites based on feature selection
Visual Studio 2008 support
MSI 4.5 Support
Adobe Flash support on billboards
Windows Mobile 6.x support and other improvements for Windows Mobile
Value Added Service - you can (optionally) install the Yahoo! Toolbar with your setup, which might be useful if your product is ad-funded.

Support for Adobe Flash animations on the billboards that are displayed during file copy is currently only available in the Express edition.

Webinar: What's New in InstallShield 2009 Express Edition
Registration required. WARNING: Anyone who knows your e-mail address can retrieve the information you entered during registration, so be careful what you enter as address, phone number, company revenue, etc.

You can buy InstallShield in the InstallSite Shop

Service Pack 1 for InstallShield 2009 available [Update]

stefan — Sat, 21 Jun 2008 08:52:00 GMT

Only two weeks after the inital release of InstallShield 2009 Acresso published a service pack. The main purpose of SP1 is to add support for the release version of Windows Installer 4.5. The inital release only supported MSI 4.5 Beta 2.

SP1 also fixes some issues that had been reported shortly after the initial release.

~~SP1 for InstallShield 2009 Premier and Professional is currently available only in English. The German and Japanese versions will be released later.~~
[Update 2008-06-27] SP1 for InstallShield 2009 Premier and Professional is now available in English, German and Japanese. [/Update]

You can obtain SP1 either using InstallShield's update functionality or from the knowledge base article below:

Q200241: InstallShield 2009 Service Pack 1 (download SP1)
Q200150: InstallShield 2009/InstallShield 2009 SP1 Release Notes (lists the issues fixed in SP1)

InstallShield 2009 Upgrade Caveats

stefan — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 10:07:20 GMT

There are many great new features, improvements and bug fixes in InstallShield 2009, as detailed in the release notes. But if you consider upgrading to the new version you also should be aware of some changes that might be a problem for your projects. I'd like to highlight the following issues, but please also review knowledge base article Q200151.

Stand Alone Build engine (SAB) is only available for owners of the Premier edition. It was removed from the Professional edition with the release of InstallShield 12, but users upgrading from InstallShield Professional 10.x or 11.x which included the SAB could get the current version free of charge. With InstallShield 2009 this is no longer possible. If you need the Stand Alone Build you must buy Premier.

FLEXnet Connect (formerly InstallShield Update Service) support is only available in MSI projects. If you are using pure InstallScript projects you can no longer add this update notification tool to your setup. For InstallScript MSI it is still available but some script functions related to FLEXnet Connect have been removed. For Basic MSI projects FLEXnet Connect continues to be supported as usual. (FLEXnet Connect is an add-on to InstallShield that is charged separately.)

For more information:

InstallShield 2009 released

stefan — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 10:30:23 GMT

Here's another TechEd announcement:

InstallShield 2009 is available

InstallShield 2009 - which is internally version 15.0 - is the first InstallShield release under the new company name Acresso. New features in this version include:

Managed Code Custom Actions - now you can write your custom actions in .NET languages like C#
Multiple Instance Installs - let users install multiple copies of your product side by side
Installation Chaining - use the new multi-package transaction support in MSI 4.5
Setup Prerequisites based on feature selection
Visual Studio 2008 support
New and improved MSI tools
MSI 4.5 Support (based on the beta version of MSI 4.5)
Hebrew and Arabic language support (in Premier Edition only)
Value Added Service - you can (optionally) install the Yahoo! Toolbar with your setup, which might be useful if your product is ad-funded.

A remark about the "Value Added Services": Please consider carefully if you really want to install things like the Yahoo! Toolbar with your software. Your customers may not appreciate it. Personally, I get annoyed if a program tries to install unrelated software or browser add-ons. On the other hand, you'd be in the company of Adobe (Adobe Reader wants to install Google Toolbar) and Apple (QuickTime wants to install iTunes, and iTunes wants to install Safari during update). InstallShield expert Christopher Painter seems to have similar objections.

Fortunately, you don't have to use the Value Added Services (they are opt-in), and there are plenty other new features that make InstallShield 2009 a very interesting release.

InstallShield 2009 Premier and Professional are available today in English, German and Japanese. The Express edition is on a different release schedule and stays at version 2008.

More information at Acresso.com
Buy InstallShield from the InstallSite Shop

Basic Introduction to InstallShield and Windows Installer

stefan — Wed, 07 May 2008 07:56:40 GMT

Found a nice blog article by Susan Gorman that introduces Windows Installer and InstallShield's role:

Basic Introduction to InstallShield and Windows Installer