How do I launch an application after install in a Visual Studio Setup Project

Question

I have created a setup project using Visual Studio 2008. After the application is finished installing, I would like to have it start up immediately. Any thoughts on how this can be done?

Answer 1

I have used a custom action in VS 2005. Not sure if this is enhanced in VS 2008.

Answer 2

I've used a script to place a checkbox "Launch [ProductName]" on the final form of the MSI. I cannot take any credit for the script though. You can find the script over on Aaron Stebner's blog at MSDN http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/archive/2006/08/12/696833.aspx

There's an interesting article about it on CodeProject and some good answers there also (which is where I found Aaron's article). http://www.codeproject.com/KB/install/Installation.aspx

Finally, there's also some other similar questions on StackOverflow

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/60565/how-to-run-executable-at-end-of-setup-project

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1270155/how-to-automatically-start-my-application-when-my-setup-is-done-in-c-setup-proje