I've been playing with the (relatively) new Suite installations, and yikes! I'm finding the learning curve as steep as learning Basic MSI was in the first place! I'm hoping you can help me with a couple tasks that seem like they should be really easy... maybe with a few examples of How Things Work, I'll start to pick up some others...
0) My first goal was to have a Suite that would intelligently recommend / select the 32-bit or 64-bit version of our application to install. That is not always according to the architecture of the machine. In MSI-land, I'd do a SystemSearch here, looking for a file down either [ProgramFilesFolder] or [ProgramFiles64Folder]. Here, there doesn't seem to be the ability to search N subfolders deep - I'd have to know the exact path. Anyone have any idea of how to accomplish this within Suite-land?
1) Instead of distribution, we've got postbuild events. The only guidance I've found as to what the set of commands are is the instruction to enter commands just as you could in the command line. Well, I've tried every variation on copy, xcopy, , hard-coded paths, quotes and no quotes that I can think of. All I want to do is move the built exe from its 7-layer-deep location to a share drive. It isn't happening, and I don't see anything about a problem in the build log. Here's the command I was testing most recently: COPY "\Setup.exe" "C:\Share" Surely someone can get this to work!
2) I added the "make the user scroll through it" license agreement dialog (LicenseAgreement_license). Sadly, I'm able to progress right through it without scrolling through anything. Am I missing a Step Two thing?
3) Back buttons! I'd like to have one from the InstallationFeatures dialog. While I see one in the preview, and the controls say that the Back button IS enabled... it's not actually there at run time. What's with that?
So frustrated! I'd have scrapped the whole thing as a half-baked feature except I remember having exactly the same feelings in my first few months of learning Basic MSI, so I'm willing to give the product the benefit of the doubt. Please help!
For (0) I would typically recommend a Platform condition in either the Eligibility condition of your packages, or as the condition for the features with which they're associated. However you say it's not related to the architecture of the machine in question, so perhaps clarifying what it is related to might help. We do not have full system search functionality in suites yet, unless you write extension conditions in C++ (see the InstallTalk blog for more on that).
For (1) I agree it should be easy. Have you tried putting in something like cmd /k echo before your command to try to debug exactly what it is running? Or just cmd /k to see if it puts out any error messages?
For (2) unless the .rtf file in question is too short, I don't know why it wouldn't work. Did you remove any existing EULA pages so you could be certain to tell them apart?
For (3) it sounds like you're running on a system using the Aero style wizard. Look for the back button in the upper-left corner. This was modified in InstallShield 2012 Spring to always use the "normal" button position.
