How do you make Inno Setup not look frozen while performing a long Exec?

Question

The long Exec is installing .NET 3.5, and out script is based off this one: http://www.blackhillsoftware.com/blog/2006/06/26/using-innosetup-with-the-dotnet-framework/

The problem is that it's using "ewWaitUntilTerminated" because we need to capture the exit code. It's made a little worse by the fact that we're running it /passive /norestart so that it's less work on the user's part (Maybe we shouldn't?)

The easiest option I could think of is to hide the window while it's installing .NET and showing it again after it's done, but I'm not sure how to do that.

The ideal solution would be to show a progress page, but it doesn't seem like it'd be possible since we'd need to return right away but somehow still be notified when the process exits and capture the exit code otherwise we'd just have an eternal progress bar.

Any ideas on how to go about this?

Edit: Minimizing would probably be better, but not sure how to do that either. We do display a message informing the user that the process may take 10-20 minutes, however the problem is that the main setup form is completely frozen, can't move, minimize or do anything with it. Also running /passive the .NET installer doesn't actually show any progress for a good minute or two on a slower machine.

Answer 1

Although it probably would be easy, I don't recommend hiding your installer while the .Net installer runs. I've seen other installers do that, and when it happens, I think the installation is finished, and then I'm confused when I find that it's really not. (And when the installation really is finished, I can't be sure of that, either. Maybe it just hid itself again.)

You can display custom pages in the Inno Setup wizard. Making such a page show a progress bar and keeping it accurate would probably be a challenge, but at least you could display a message on the wizard page saying that your installer is waiting for the .Net installer before proceeding. See the "Using Custom Wizard Pages" section of the help file.

Answer 2

We've needed to install .NET with a couple products, and have taken two approaches:

• When installing .NET with Innosetup, we let the user know that the installation will take a long time, and to expect a certain message when it is complete
• We start the .NET set up without any flags to force the client through it. This way if they're more technically inclined they know why the install is taking so long

We've honestly had better luck with the 2nd option, particularly now that more system admins seem to lock down desktops to a certain degree.

Answer 3

You can simply hide the installer wizard form by calling

WizardForm.Hide;
Exec(...);
WizardForm.Show;

though I agree that this is not really pretty.