If you need to install a 100% .NET product, should you prefer MSI installers? Why?
Thanks.
+1
A:
Few benefits taken from this link -
* Can be advertised. So that on demand installation could take place.
* Like advertisement, features can be installed as soon as the user tries to them.
* State management is maintained so Windows Installer provides an a way to let administrators see if an application is installed on a machine.
* Ability to rollback if an installation fails.
Another link to help the cause - http://www.msiexe.com/msi-or-exe-setup.html
Sachin Shanbhag
2010-10-20 09:08:51
+1
A:
If the application will be installed by admins pushing your app out to lots of computers or if it'll be included as part of a bigger installation, then a MSI might be better.
ho1
2010-10-20 09:10:15
It's relative easy to make a tree of msi files, and as an admin you can preconfigure a msi file to make easy deployment within an organisation.
Onkelborg
2010-10-20 09:11:49
+1
A:
An MSI installer will typically accompanied by a setup.exe bootstrapper:
What are the specific differences between .msi and setup.exe file?
0xA3
2010-10-20 09:12:32
+1
A:
The most important thing to understand is that MSI is meant to be a benefit to customers not vendors. The ability of a SysAdmin to be able to examine the MSI to know what it will do to their machine and the ability to transform/tailor said behavior to their unique needs is priceless. Add in the standardized logging, command line behavior, transactional nature and so on and you can begin to understand why (despite it's various limitations ) MSI is so valuable.
Christopher Painter
2010-10-23 02:36:21