In wxs file

With our own nested folders, we have to specify each level separately:. Note that for each element and this will be the case throughout the use of WiX we have to provide an Id identifier. Most of the time, these identifiers must be unique because we will cross-reference them all across the WiX source file, so make sure you come up with a naming scheme that makes it easy to follow.

In some cases like ProgramFilesFolder we can use predefined names. We will later refer to this property name again. The notion of components and the rules governing their use are probably the most important concepts of the Windows Installer technology and failing to observe these rules is the primary reason for failing setups.

Thus, it is very important for us to get a good understanding of components before we can go on with our first sample. The component is the atomic unit of things to be installed.

It consists of resourcesfiles, registry keys, shortcuts, or anything elsethat should always be installed as a single unit. Installing a component should never influence other components, removing one should never damage another component or leave any orphaned resource on the target machine. As a consequence, components cannot share files: the same file going to the same location must never be included in more than one component.

It's not at the component level that you have to think about what files make up your product. If the product requires an EXE, three DLLs and a couple of data files, this doesn't mean they have to go into a single component, quite the opposite.

Later on, we will decide at a higher level of the hierarchy what components belong together to form a standalone part of your product. Again, a component should only contain items that belong together so strongly that they always need to be installed or removed together.

If this means a single file, then your components will contain a single file each. This is not only normal but exactly what you're expected to do.

Don't be afraid, Windows Installer can efficiently handle thousands of components or more, if needed. So, we have a component consisting of three items, a file and two shortcuts pointing to it. A component has to have its own Id identifier as well as its own, unique GUID the WiX compiler and linker will warn you if you happen to reuse any of these two. This is very importantthese GUIDs are the only means for Windows Installer to keep track of the various components.

Breaking the component rules will have dire consequences: resources can be left orphaned on the machine during removal, a shared resource might be erroneously removed while another application still needs it, reinstallation of an existing product might fail to restore the functionality, installing the new version of an application can break the previous one. A file is specified by its name. Apart from the actual names, you can decorate the file with several other attributes.

Vital , when set to no , tells the installer that installing this file is not of vital importance. Normally, if installing any file fails for any reason, the installation will be aborted, the user will not be allowed to ignore the problem. Other attributes include ReadOnly , Hidden , System , all making the file to have the appropriate attribute set when installed. Each component needs a key path.

This is the item Windows Installer can later check to see whether the component is actually installed. Although this doesn't seem very important right now when we only learn to install it in the first place, it is important to specify such a key path for every component we use in order to support the uninstallation and repair functionality of the Installer. The complete Project.

Besides the main executable, it is possible to include additional resource files to the install, such icon resources, dlls, etc. Create the Feature Component with the CreateFolder bit inside. Hi Roland what is meant is that the Visual Studio solution contains 2 x projects — i. Hopefully the other information contained is still useful. I found it a real pain to do certain installer-related tasks that I take for granted using other installer packages.

Finally, my favorite reason is that it gives you greater control over how things work. You can find the latest version of Wix. Before using some of the functionality inWix, you can download the recent version of windows installer or you can check your current version by viewing the help file msiexe.

Here is the link to get the new Window installer, Microsoft download center. This will create a project with a signle. NET custom action. As you can see from the above Wix main element has xmlns or XML namespace , this brings the core Wix elements into the local code, so we need to add 2 more xmlns to provide IIS, UTIL elements to current code, change the Wix element as below.

Language code attribute is used to display error message other information in the specified language to the user. InstallerScope: Use this attribute to specify the installation scope of this package: per-machine or per-user.

MediaTemplate element comes after package element, what it does is, it compresses the files you are intended to install into CAB files and shipped along with installer as. Cab file extension. Before discussing how to set install directory path and how to choose several default directory properties provided by the windows installer , first we need to understand what is the Directory element, how to tell wix installer what files you are going to install under the directory.

A Directory element describes the physical directory path layout for your software or product, also specifies the mappings between source [Published files or to be packaged in to Msi] and target [Target path windows installer to copy those files] directories. Now we learned how to map the target directory that you want create during the installation, next step is to copy files into them. Above code snippet instructs the installer to copy the InstallMe.

Use DirectoryRef element to reference your directories, one benefit of this option is, you can keep the Xml markup elements that define your directories independent from the markup that add files to those directories. After adding the DirectoryRef element inside the Fragment element, you need to add this DirectoryRef element inside the Feature element. Feature element is the direct child of Product element.

If failed to do so, WiX shows this message. If this is a Product , every Component must have at least one parent Feature. Group your components inside of a ComponentGroup and use its Directory attribute to set the target directory.

Once you done adding files to components and referenced in side product features, build the solutions, on successful, you can see MSI under the bin folder [Debug or Release]. Here are the steps to run the MSI. You can copy to any directory and point to that directory. Change the directory to point to your bin folder Use below command to install the software. Change the directory to point to your bin folder Now type below command to instruct the windows installer to uninstall the software.

See below screenshot.