I wanted to write an NSIS script, let's call it for now setup.nsi, and check
if several required dll files already exists in $SYSDIR
Let me emphasize on the word "several"
What I understand from nsis IfFileExists documentation is that if I type in:
IfFileExists $SYSDIR\blabla.dll +2 +1
then it checks if blabla.dll is in $SYSDIR .. but what if I want to know if *.dll from where setup.nsi copies the file (i.e. the *.dll's that I am interested in installing in.. and they are a lot of them.. so I can't just go around checking for all the names) exists in $SYSDIR
During uninstallation I want to then be able to delete them from $SYSDIR (using some uninstall.log to see if I really copied them in $SYSDIR.. and again the wildcard question).
Please be patient with me as I am really new to NSIS scripts.
Is it REALLY necessary to write and delete in $SYSDIR ? Unless yours is a system file, there's no reason for it to be in $__SYS__DIR. If you need to use a specific version of a library, consider DLL redirection (put your DLL in your app dir and use the .local feature) - see the MSDN article on DLL redirection and Side-by-side assemblies.
Plus, you are one typo away from wrecking the user's computer ("Deleted: C:\Windows\System32\user32.dll").
As Piskvor mentions, I don't think you should be worrying about deleting system DLLs in the uninstaller. In case you want to overwrite system DLLs with an updated version, you may want to look at the SetOverwrite command. It lets you overwrite files if what you've got is newer.
Windows XP (SP2?) and up has file protection for system32, so you can't overwrite system critical files in there.
Do try to stay away from that.
Also, to check for your file specifically, see if there's a plugin for NSIS that can calculate checksums and compare that on uninstall. That's probably the safest, IF you really need to do it.
I'd suggest install files somewhere else and add that to PATH.
Related
I have seen this was asked in the bask back in 2008 and can't find anything newer on the subject so I am bring it up again.
Is there a way to prevent a user from extracting the files from the installer and reading the nsi file.
I read something the opcode needs to be changed in the exe of nsis. Has NSIS come up with a plugin or something so users do not have to modify the exe?
If there an easy way or is it still messing with the exe. and if so can you point me in the right direction on how to do this or if someone has already posted a version
Thank!
NSIS is open source so it is not unsurprising that people are able to write decompilers.
There is no easy way to prevent it and the recommended method is still the same; change the order of the opcodes in \Source\exehead\fileform.h and compile NSIS.
To prevent most people from getting access to your files you can use one of the zip/7z/rar plug-ins from the NSIS Wiki that accepts a password and include a password protected archive in your installer. Keep in mind that a sophisticated user can run the installer in a debugger and find your password when you call the plug-in to extract the files.
I have a customer using Host Intrusion Protection and has set every User's temp folder not to allow execution (C:\users\\AppData\Local\Temp). NSIS extracts all plugin dlls and its own dlls into a folder below %TEMP%. The problem is nothing is allow to execute from temp so the entire install fails. What I need to know is how to tell NSIS to use a different folder. The only work around I can find is to edit the TEMP and TMP values under the registry key HCU\Environment from "%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Temp" to something like C:\NSISTEMP. However even though this works changing the registry and then putting it back is not really an option. I also cannot just redirect InitPluginDir as that only effects plug-ins and not the rest of what NSIS extracts (icons xml files etc...). Any ideas?s
You can set %TMP% in a terminal/console window before running the installer, there is no need to edit the registry.
In NSIS v3+ you can use UnsafeStrCpy:
Function .onInit
UnsafeStrCpy $Temp "c:\foo\bar"
CreateDirectory "$Temp"
FunctionEnd
The real problem is the security "solution", why would preventing execution from %Temp% but not from other directories really provide any protection after the bad guys find out about this restriction?
If the installer is started with the special _?=$InstDir parameter then it is not copied to %Temp%.
Try this (look for more info in documentation) maybe it is safer than overriding $Temp folder and so on.
Hi I am writing nsis script for a patch installer. Before installer copies new files I need to check if any process is using the files I want to replace and I want rename those files to tmp and delete them on reboot.
Is there any way installer can detect that if any process is using those files (in my case the files I am going to install are dlls).
There is no native way in NSIS how to do this. But there are third party tools which can detect dlls used by certain process - maybe you could use them in your installer.
But my question is: Do you really need to detect this?
What about deleting files directly with Delete /REBOOTOK file command? (http://nsis.sourceforge.net/Docs/Chapter4.html#4.9.4.11)
If /REBOOTOK is specified and the file cannot be deleted then the file is deleted when the system reboots.
Could any one clarify me that, when uninstalling I need to delete everything form the Installation folder except the License file. How can I do it with NSIS scripting?
Thanks
Regards,
RoboAlex.
Instead of opening the file, as in Anders' third point, I'd do it this way:
Rename $INSTDIR\license.txt $PLUGINSDIR\license.txt
RMDir /R $INSTDIR # Remembering, of course, that you should do this with care
CreateDirectory $INSTDIR
Rename $PLUGINSDIR\license.txt $INSTDIR\license.txt
Depending on when it gets to the file it can't delete, RMDir /R may leave most of it behind, as I believe it will stop when it can't delete something; this way will get rid of it all properly. This will also lose the directory stats, but that's probably not important.
I'd recommend one of Anders' first two solutions over this, though. They're more precise.
Off the top of my head, there are 3 ways to do this:
Use Delete on one file at the time on a list generated at compile time with !system etc
Use FindFirst/FindNext/FindClose at runtime and Delete everything except the license based on filename
A bit of a hack, but you should be able to open the license file for write/append, then Delete/RMDir will not be able to delete the file since it has a open handle.
I'm having trouble using macros in my .inf file that I'm using to create my cab, specifically when setting the InstallDir string. If I do something like this:
InstallDir=\<PathToProgramFiles>\MyAppName
then everything works fine. However, if I do this:
InstallDir=%CE1%\MyAppName
then I get the following error when trying to install the cab (double tapping it on my device): "MyAppName was not installed successfully. Please run Setup again."
This only seems to apply to the built-in macro strings. I can use %AppName% without any problems. Maybe there is some registry setting that isn't properly set that would normally resolve the %CE1% macro?
Any ideas about what is going on?
Edit: My device doesn't have a \Program Files directory. It seems the %CE1% macro always resolves to that path and if the InstallDir specified in the inf file doesn't exist (with the exception of the last directory portion then the install fails. Manually creating \Program Files fixed the issue. Since a lot of the devices I'm working with have different paths for their Program Files directory, is there a generic way to get the installer to default to the actual Program Files dir? I guess my only other option is to not specify a path and force the user to choose one?
First, in this link you can find the shortcuts and their meaning (the %C..%), goto appendix B. The Windows CE5 MSDN link.
You can add a Setup Dll to your CAB installaer that will check the directory structure and will create a folder in case it does not exist. You may find this SO question useful.
A warning: If you are targeting regular Windows CE devices, beware where you place the files as it can be to a RAM based file system and then the files will disappear after reboot.