I recently upgraded from InstallShield 2015 to InstallShield 2023 R2. I am attempting to upgrade my preexisting Basic MSI projects to the newer version, but when built they do not have the same file output. When built in InstallShield 2015 using the Network Image media type and uncompressed the output to the Disk 1 folder contains all of the files and folders for the install, setup.exe, Project.msi, and that is all. When building the same project using the same settings in InstallShield 2023 R2 I get two additional files: setup.ini and 0x0409.ini.
Is there anyway for me to embed these two extra files into the setup.exe? Or just to set it up where they don't build and aren't needed?
I've seen this behaviour before - If its the same issue it is related to the removal of "Include MSI 3.1 Engine" in the release options of your project in IS2023 onwards. (IS2022 and prior had this option)
Compressing setup.ini and 0x0409.ini into the setup.exe was done as part of an internal implementation detail when including the MSI 3.1 Engine. It was not offered as a documentated feature, and unfortunatley we can't go back to enabling the 3.1 Engine again.
It was decided that this functionality was working as designed with the uncompressed option.
Does it cause any functionality issues leaving setup.ini and 0x0409.ini files uncompressed?
I had a suspicion that the removal of the MSI 3.1 engine was the cause.
Realistically, no there is no functionality issue. The preference would be to build it without these files, but I don't see any negative side effects to them being there.
