What does the app builder wrap?

[GregFreeman]

Just for the sake of my own curiosity, I was wondering if anyone knew what is "wrapped" in the NI builder in order to create installers? Is the .NET Installer class being used to create installers, or something else?

I was also wondering if there is something like the OpenG MSI Installer Builder that can be used with newer versions of LabVIEW? It seems it can't be used after LV7.1. I really like the idea of being able to customize my installers to look a little less plain during installation. If not, I wouldn't mind throwing my own together if someone could point me in the right direction. Or, even if one does exist, I wouldn't mind writing my own for the sake of learning.

Thanks.

[hooovahh]

I'm not quite sure what you're asking, so I'll answer the question I think you are asking, because I know the answer to that question.

In the past I've used Inno Setup to make software installers. Part of the installer has the ability to have standard installs, custom, minimal, and settings for what to do based on the users selection, as well as installation directory and what to do during an uninstall. I've used this in the past to install several NI components at once. Lets say I had LabVIEW Run-Time engine, the TDMS for Excel Add on, and maybe any number of other NI installers, in my build. Then each of these can be a checkbox during the install, which will simply run the setup.exe for each component, with what ever silent switches that are needed. I've also used ISTool which is a piece of software that helps make Inno Setup installers.

I don't believe there is much for UI customization, I've always used the plain one.

One thing I would be interested in is how JKI does it for VIPM. I'm guessing what they do is very customized and probably not something worth sharing.

Edited July 12, 2012 by hooovahh

[Ton Plomp]

What JKI does with VIPM, is making an executable, zipping the executable up.

Store that zip as a string inside a VI. Then use the installer VI to extract the zip-stream.

(you notice I cut some corners in this process, and this is all just guesswork [citation needed]).

Ton

[crelf]

In the past I've used Inno Setup to make software installers...I've also used ISTool which is a piece of software that helps make Inno Setup installers.

Strongly agree - I use these when I find the NI installer lacking, or need to bundle several NI and nonNI installers together. Inno Setup is super powerful, and free (although I strongly suggest you make a donation if you find it useful to support continued development a support of future installer/OS versions).

[hooovahh]

What JKI does with VIPM, is making an executable, zipping the executable up.

Store that zip as a string inside a VI. Then use the installer VI to extract the zip-stream.

Ton

That's one way of doing it. If I was going to make my own installer, I would build an EXE with LabVIEW 7.1 or older, so that the runtime engine can be included. I would put my real EXE (built with modern LabVIEW) in a subfolder along with any support files (possibly the required runtime engine as well). Then zip all that and convert it to an EXE that runs my 7.1 EXE after getting extracted to a temp folder. That way there is only one EXE to the user, that they run, extracts and runs a LabVIEW EXE and runs without any runtime engines installed, and from there can install my application or other components.

Of course coding in 7.1 isn't impossible, but there are some functions that are taken for granted that I may have to code my self which were not available then. Also I'll essentially be including two run time engines. The 7.1 runtime engine was around 12MB zipped up so it won't add alot of space but still is extra code that won't be used after the install.

I've never done this approach, because it is re-inventing the wheel and supporting a tool seems like a pain, for very little added benefit.

[Rolf Kalbermatter]

Just for the sake of my own curiosity, I was wondering if anyone knew what is "wrapped" in the NI builder in order to create installers? Is the .NET Installer class being used to create installers, or something else?

I was also wondering if there is something like the OpenG MSI Installer Builder that can be used with newer versions of LabVIEW? It seems it can't be used after LV7.1. I really like the idea of being able to customize my installers to look a little less plain during installation. If not, I wouldn't mind throwing my own together if someone could point me in the right direction. Or, even if one does exist, I wouldn't mind writing my own for the sake of learning.

Thanks.

They use the MSI API which is basically the official low level API to the Microsoft Installer technology. It's a super complex system based on a relational database system to manage all the packages, versioning, dependencies and what else that a packaging management system needs to maintain. There are probably higher level MSI interfaces based on .Net and ActiveX but the core API is a pure DLL based interface in MSI.DLL but I doubt would be useful to try to interface with the Call Library Node directly. NI uses a DLL interface that was probably developed by the LabWindows CVI group to support creating installers from applications developed in it.

I have read some time ago a comment by a former member of the MSI developer group, who admitted that choosing for a relational database system for this, was probably more than a little bit of overkill but that once that decision had been made there was really no way of going back and changing much anymore.

The whole MSI technology used is therefore really Windows provided, and the application builder just uses a higher level API that allows the minimum amount of customization to this functionality that is required by the NI application builder. It could of course provide more flexibility but the cost of such a solution is simply enormous, the knowledge to use these options rather high, and therefore unlikely to be used by most.

I believe that the OpenG Builder did interface to an undocumented VI to plug into the application builder part of the MSI component and LabVIEW 8.0 changed the entire Application Builder so that the OpenG Builder broke. However at the same time NI documented part of the application builder VI interface so that it was possible to access those methods outside of the project interface.