Spending more than an hour on figuring out if an equivalent solution to the problem of Multiple CAB installer exists for Windows Mobile in the lazarus cross-platfor compiler I have become tired? I mean the code that represents roughly the same functionality as:
http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/65319/Automatically-Install-Multiple-CAB-Files-to-a-Wind
but as far as I can say it is not possible by interior inf declaration, nor by:
http://wiki.lazarus.freepascal.org/WinCE_Programming_Tips#Installation_of_an_app_build_with_Lazarus_on_a_WinCE_device
Do you know any solution to that?
You are confusing two concepts with one. The first link describes how to use ActiveSync's deployment architecture to deploy multiple CAB files from the PC serially. One CAB file is pushed down to the device and extracted, then the next is pushed down and extracted. This is done by hooking into the extensibility for a desktop MSI file and Windows installer.
This should work fine for any set of CABs - Lazarus or not. To this system a CAB file is a CAB file, the contents are not relevant.
The second link is a description of an INF file (among other thigs). This is an input file for CABWIZ.exe, which is a desktop tool that simply generates CAB files that can be used on a WinMo/WinCE device. even if you generate a CAB that contains another CAB with CABWIZ, the device side of things (wceload.exe) does not support extracting a CAb within a CAB.
It's a fundamental limitation that you can't avoid. To make things worse, newer versions of WinMo can't have two instances of wceload running, so you can't launch (via a custom installer DLL) a second instance of WCELOAD to extract an internal CAB.
You best solution is to not try. Just extract everything for your app on your PC - app, references, resources - everything. Then create an INF to package it all into one CAB (not a CAB inside a CAB) and then deploy that CAB.
Related
I created some custom modules and Visual Studio drops the build files directly into the Kofax Bin directory. It is important to note that I'm using the modules as Winforms applications and Windows services (at the same time). The generated files are
MyModule.exe
MyModule.exe.config
MyModule.InstallLog
MyModule.InstallState
MyModule.pdb
I think that I only need the .exe file here. Of course I also add the .aex file to the directory to install the module. I also created two batch files to register the module on the local machine
RegAscEx.exe MyModule.aex
pause
and to install the module as a Windows service
"C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\installutil.exe" "%~dp0MyModule.exe"
pause
after running them as administrator I can delete them from the directory of course. I would like to know if it should be always fine to provide the .exe file, .aex file and the two batch files (which will be deleted later) only?
Basically correct. Some thoughts:
Build your application using the Release configuration (vs Debug). See discussion here.
PDB files usually are not needed in production. Still, you may want to generate and keep them if you plan on debugging in production.
The app.config file should be kept. Maybe you want to use application settings later on, and the supportedRuntime element is useful if someone wants to run your CM on a machine without that version of .NET framework being present (Windows will show a nice error message)
Keep the AEX file. This is required if someone wants to register your CM on another machine (e.g. deploying from DEV > TEST > PROD).
Include a single batch file that allows registering your CM on a new machine as well as adding it to Kofax Capture. Here's an example:
rem "C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\RegAsm.exe" SmartCAP.CM.Sample.dll /codebase /tlb:SmartCAP.CM.Sample.tlb
rem RegAscSc.exe /f Register.inf
Another thing I usually include is the ability to install my CM in a similar fashion to native KC modules, for example: SmartCAP.CM.Sample.exe -install and SmartCAP.CM.Sample.exe -uninstall. Take a look at the AssemblyInstaller class for details.
I have a windows desktop application which is currently available on a Linux server for download on user's machine. I want to automate the process of MSI packaging on the same Linux server using any EXE/DLL.
I have an App.exe and App.txt file. Some information should be read from text file and injected into exe before creating an MSI package. This entire process has to happen dynamically in the Linux server only after the user clicks on download.
Can anybody point me in the right direction as to how i can achieve my goal? I want to achieve the same by having minimum dependencies on any additional/3rd party tool. TIA for any time and effort.
p.s - I have done some R&D about various installers but none of them were matching the criteria as they have too many dependencies.
False Positive Risk: Creating a new binary for every user would seem to be very unwise because of malware scanners and their ability to recognize "known" versions of binaries (by hash).
If you create a new binary for each user, the malware suite might suddenly start to quarantine your setup without any warning or sense. This problem is not trivial anymore as malware control is hardened everywhere and setups that run with elevated rights are "prime suspects for risk management".
Digital signatures can help, but they are merely a guarantee that you made the setup, and not a guarantee that the setup doesn't contain anything harmful. Nothing worse than signed malware vectors. In fact it is proof positive that the malware came from you :-). Note: some people even manage to tamper with signed executables. The combination of the latter two fact is very troubling.
Application Setup: I like to eliminate such features and details from the setup and make the application itself responsible for it own configuration on first launch after installation. I find this more reliable and easier to debug.
Custom Configuration: You can apply custom configuration information at runtime via various mechanisms. You should add in a transform, or you can create a batch file next to the setup with this information embedded and pass to the MSI or the setup.exe.
Batch File?: The msiexec.exe command line supports passing parameters to the MSI. You can generate a batch file that will run the setup with such parameters if you design your setup to support these "incoming" parameters.
msiexec.exe /i myinstaller.msi ADDLOCAL="Program,Dictionaries" SERIALKEY="1234-1234" /qn
Transform: You can also create a transform to contain the parameters (a transform is a tiny MSI fragment with settings and changes to the original MSI):
msiexec.exe /i myinstaller.msi TRANSFORMS="mytransform.mst" /qn
A transform would be difficult to create on a Linux box, seeing as they are COM-structured storage files native to Windows only. I am not sure if it is even possible, but maybe.
Some Links:
Can the resulting command line be determined after running an .msi installer?
Change Program Name and Shortcut Title during installation
How to make better use of MSI files
We have had some success with wixl from msitools.
Also WiX will run under WINE.
However, in both cases we have not had EmbedCab="yes" work, which may or may not affect you.
maybe I am blind or I don't understand something right. I have created some HelloWorld-App and now I would like to test in on my device directly. (not via Visual Studios' Remote Tools)
So created my app package in VS but selected "No" for "Uploading to Windows Store" since I want to try it out localy.
The build an verification is successful and all but at the end I got a folder ("HelloWorld_1.0.1.0_Test") in the "AppPackages"-Folder. There are a couple of files. .appxbundle, .appxsym (for each architectiure one)
But if I want to install an app via the device manager it requires an .appx file. Where do I get this one?
I googled a lot, but I only found the descriptions for using the Windows Store.
Isn't it possible without it or am I missing something?
Kind Regards
Pavel
I don't know which device manager you install it through, but an appxbundle should be the fine. It's a ZIP file which includes several appx files (for several display scales, languages, ...).
But generally, inside the AppPackages folder there should be a folder like "AppName_1.0.0.0_Test". VS creates not only the appxbundle there, but also a Powershell script Add-AppDevPackage.ps1. Run it as admin and it installs the app if sideloading is enabled. This should be the easiest option to test apps on other machines without Store submissions.
I want to make a CAB file on a WinCE 5/6 device.
The idea is that someone would run a backup script that creates the CAB file, which can then be loaded back onto the device at any point restoring settings to a previously known point.
The settings are xml and custom files in various folders on the device, I am not talking specifically about registry settings.
If this cannot be done is there (commercially) free ZIP file creation software that could be used?
Thankyou in advance
Chris
DotNetZip is a free zip library that will let you do this.
See also:
zip and unzip files and folders on Mobile Device
Is doing this from the desktop side any good?
You can use this registry tool using ActiveSync. The tool has a nice feature of Reg->CAB. Once you want to restore settings, you can clean the registry using OALIoCtlHalGetHiveCleanFlag and then run the CAB to restore the settings.
I know this does not include the requirement:
run a backup script
But it is a quick solution that might give you an idea.
I'm looking for something that can copy (preferably only changed) files from a development machine to a staging machine and finally to a set of production machines.
A "what if" mode would be nice as would the capability to "rollback" the last deployment. Database migrations aren't a necessary feature.
UPDATE: A free/low-cost tool would be great, but cost isn't the only concern. A tool that could actually manage deployment from one environment to the next (dev->staging->production instead of from a development machine to each environment) would also be ideal.
The other big nice-to-have is the ability to only copy changed files - some of our older sites contain hundreds of .asp files.
#Sean Carpenter can you tell us a little more about your environment? Should the solution be free? simple?
I find robocopy to be pretty slick for this sort of thing. Wrap in up in a batch file and you are good to go. It's a glorified xcopy, but deploying my website isn't really hard. Just copy out the files.
As far as rollbacks... You are using source control right? Just pull the old source out of there. Or, in your batch file, ALSO copy the deployment to another folder called website yyyy.mm.dd so you have a lovely folder ready to go in an emergency.
look at the for command for details on how to get the parts of the date.
robocopy.exe
for /?
Yeah, it's a total "hack" but it moves the files nicely.
For some scenarios I used a freeware product called SyncBack (Download here).
It provides complex, multi-step file synchronization (filesystem or FTP etc., compression etc.). The program has a nice graphical user interface. You can define profiles and group/execute them together.
You can set filter on file types, names etc. and execute commands/programs after the job execution. There is also a job log provided as html report, which can be sent as email to you if you schedule the job.
There is also a professional version of the software, but for common tasks the freeware should do fine.
You don't specify if you are using Visual Studio .NET, but there are a few built-in tools in Visual Studio 2005 and 2008:
Copy Website tool -- basically a visual synchronization tool, it highlights files and lets you copy from one to the other. Manual, built into Visual Studio.
aspnet_compiler.exe -- lets you precompile websites.
Of course you can create a web deployment package and deploy as an MSI as well.
I have used a combination of Cruise Control.NET, nant and MSBuild to compile, and swap out configuration files for specific environments and copy the files to a build output directory. Then we had another nant script to do the file copying (and run database scripts if necessary).
For a rollback, we would save all prior deployments, so theoretically rolling back just involved redeploying the last working build (and restoring the database).
We used UnleashIt (unfortunate name I know) which was nicely customizable and allowed you to save profiles for deploying to different servers. It also has a "backup" feature which will backup your production files before deployment so rollback should be pretty easy.
I've given up trying to find a good free product that works.
I then found Microsoft's Sync Toy 2.0 which while lacking in options works well.
BUT I need to deploy to a remote server.
Since I connect with terminal services I realized I can select my local hard drive when I connect and then in explorer on the remote server i can open \\tsclient\S\MyWebsite on the remote server.
I then use synctoy with that path and synchronize it with my server. Seems to work pretty well and fast so far...
Maybe rsync plus some custom scripts will do the trick.
Try repliweb. It handles full rollback to previous versions of files. I've used it whilst working for a client who demanded its use and I;ve become a big fan of it, partiularily:
Rollback to previous versions of code
Authentication and rules for different user roles
Deploy to multiple environments
Full reporting to the user via email / logs statiing what has changed, what the current version is etc.