Best tool to create MSI [closed]

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Closed 8 years ago.

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I am new to setup project creation. Now I am using Visual studio 2008 to create setup file (msi) for my project. I am quit uncomfortable in creating my own custom forms in the installation wizard as well as upgrading an existing version of my project to a new version.

Is there any other alternatives to create MSI/MSP package for Dot net projects?

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Creating MSI is not always an easy task - one tool that definitely helps is WiX - Windows Installer XML - a free-ware, open-source project run by Microsoft employees in their free time.

It's quite messy, though, to get into it - here's a good WiX Tutorial for starters.

Another interesting approach is "Wix#" (WiX Sharp) - a C# frontend that outputs WiX script from C# source - quite intriguing.

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Depends on your budget. If you are comfortable spending $US100-300 dollars or more you might take a look at Advanced Installer (would be my choice), Tarma installer (I believe it's the cheapest installer product from all listed here), WixAware or InstallAware, Wise and InstallShield also offer/support MSI.

Advanced Installer guys do offer a free version, however it is very very limited (you can't even register assemblies in GAC or do some other things needed for simple installations - like displaying EULA). I would also recommend to try out and dive into WiX.

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Why not use NSIS. Free to use, a lot of documentation, and some awesome plugins for whatever they can't do natively.

Even integrates with Eclipse, if that is your editor of choice.

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If you are using VS2008, then you can add a setup project to your solution that you can then use to create the .msi and the setup.exe that you will be able to use to install your application. You didn't specify a specific language so that is an example of how I create an installer package for my C++ apps in VS2008. You can find all the information you need to do that by opening up help in VS2008 and finding deployment in the index.