Doctor Deploys Blog

Our friends at InstallAware had some questions on issues we have yet to answer in the beta MSI.CHM. One of these questions was:

Question:
Do the new API’s Msi(Begin/Join/End)Transaction work with external UI as well as the new internal UI?

Answer:

Yes, Begin and End work from external UI/chainer. For the internal case, the Begin and End are implicit in the fact there is a install ready running so one only needs Join for the internal case.

Have a look at Figures 3, 10, and 12 in the white paper labeled “Agile Product Advances in Windows Installer 4 5 - Beta Release Draft” for a simplified view of the expected data flow. Figure 3 is a base diagram for what is done today using a external chainer. Figure 10 is adds the Begin and End APIs to the external chainer control flow seen in Figure 3. Figure 12 will shows the control flow for an internal chainer.

The API we’re missing for Beta is a change owner where

• an external chainer can pass control to an internal chainer


• two external chainers can pass control between each other

Given Figure 3 is our base assumption for generic chainer behavior, if anyone’s chainer does follow this pattern, we’d love to know.

[Author: Robert Flaming]
This posting is provided “AS IS” with no warranties, and confers no rights. Use of included script samples are subject to the terms specified at http://www.microsoft.com/info/cpyright.htm.

Original post by Windows Installer Team

Our friends at InstallAware had some questions on issues we have yet to answer in the beta MSI.CHM. One of these questions was:

Question
Is it possible to silently run the Vista installation package for MSI 4.5?

Answer

Fair question. I didn’t get that documentation updated for the beta. I’ll enter a doc bug for the MSDN topic “Windows Installer Redistributables” at http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa372856.aspx.

The .MSU file format is a new package type for Windows Vista (and above) which contain updates to the Windows platform. These .MSU packages have an executable called wusa.exe to which you can pass command line switches. This separate EXE method is similar to the way msiexec.exe is the runtime for.msi packages. The wusa.exe is more formally known as the Windows Update Stand-alone Installer.

There are two KB articles for how to work with the Windows Update Stand-alone Installer. These are

• “Description of the Windows Update Stand-alone Installer (Wusa.exe) and of .msu files in Windows Vista” at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/934307


• “When you run Wusa.exe together with the /quiet option to try to install certain software packages on a Windows Vista-based computer, the installation fails” at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929761/.

The need for KB 929761 is something we found late in testing and are still investigating our options.

With the new Vista specific packaging technology, the old instructions for how to defer the reboot also needs to be updated. When the new .MSU packages are processed, the Transacted File System (TxF at http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa365456.aspx) is used. One of the qualities of the Windows Update Stand-alone Installer use of TxF is that if any file is in use, the entire update is deferred until after reboot. Given the Windows Shell often has Windows Installer loaded, we expect this means that applying the Windows Installer 4.5 Beta on Vista will often require reboots.

We do have reboot reduction work planned for after Beta. We are conscious that most users find one reboot difficult to manage and more than one reboot baffling. This presents an opportunity for chainers to provide high quality reboot management.

[Author: Robert Flaming]
This posting is provided “AS IS” with no warranties, and confers no rights. Use of included script samples are subject to the terms specified at http://www.microsoft.com/info/cpyright.htm.

Original post by Windows Installer Team