Installshield questions

[percylong]

Hi,

I'm looking to take the plunge with IS2012 but I've got some general questions regarding InstallShield usage and licensing - hopefully you can help.

We use VS 2010\TFS 2010, so I think we'd need 1 license on the TFS server and 1 build license per build machine. I'd do the IS development on the TFS server.

My question is, if I was to add an IS project to a solution, would the developers have to exclude it from the build configuration (i.e. debug) in order to build locally (F5)? Does the collaborator license allow the developer to build locally, and can does the IS proj file load successfully in VS with collaborator installed?

Lastly, are the build licenses per build machine or per build agent? (We've 2 agents on most of the build machines)

I'm a little concerned that after buying a premier or professional license we're going to discover we actually need tons of build and collaborator licenses further down the line.

I've tried contacting the flexera support email with these questions by they haven't replied! Hopefully they're a bit better once you're registered?

Thanks in advance for your help!
Alex

[RebeccaB]

Dear Alex:

These are good questions. I will address the questions that concern the functionality of the products.

As for the licensing, because we offer both System-User (i.e., Nodelock) Licensing and Usage (i.e., Concurrent) licensing options, licensing questions can be answered much better by the Flexera Software Sales team. For more information on the licensing options to meet your current and future needs, please contact the Flexera Software Sales department at (847)466-6000 or (800)809-5659.

The InstallShield Premier or Professional product provides functionality to create and modify InstallShield project .ism files through the InstallShield IDE or the Visual Studio IDE. This product can also build an InstallShield product from within the InstallShield IDE, from within the Visual Studio IDE or by launching the ISCmdBld.exe tool from the command line or from an MSBuild task.

The InstallShield Standalone Build provides functionality for building the InstallShield project .ism file by launching the ISCmdBld.exe tool from the command line or from an MSBuild task. To enhance build automation, Standalone Build also provides APIs you can call from a program to modify the InstallShield project .ism file.

InstallShield Collaboration does not create or build InstallShield project .ism files. The Collaboration tool creates manifests (.dim files). These manfests or DIMs are intended to contain installation resources, such as files, registry entries, shortcuts or IIS definitions that pertain to a particular piece of a product. They are not full installation projects. Once created, the .dim files can be absorbed into InstallShield project .ism files. To absorb or insert a .dim file into an InstallShield project .ism file requires using the InstallShield Premier Edition or using the APIs provided by the Standalone Build Product.

If a development machine does not have InstallShield Professional/Premier or InstallShield Standalone Build installed, then the MSBuild tasks in the .isproj file will fail when building the Visual Studio solution. As you suggested, to avoid these build failures, one can use the Visual Studio Configuration Manager to create configurations that include or exclude the InstallShield project build when building the solution.

I hope this helps clarify the functionality of the different InstallShield product offerings.

Rebecca