Standalone Build availability

[rchand445]

The standalone build module is currently available only for users who purchase the premier edition of Installshield 2009. That was not the case in the past, up until the issuance of Installshield 12.

When Installshield 12 was released, the end user license agreement stated that "users of earlier versions of InstallShield Professional Edition (10, 10.5, 11, and 11.5) are also entitled to use the Standalone Build".

Would owners of legacy Installshield products still have access to use the standalone build module for Installshield 2009? I did not see any references stating as such in the EULA lfor Installshield 2009..

[Christopher_Pai]

I am searching for the download link as well.

[TheTraveler]

I would like to know as well... Thank you...

[Christopher_Pai]

http://blog.deploymentengineering.com/2008/06/installshield-stand-alone-build.html

I encourage everyone to contact Acresso or leave a comment on my blog and make your feelings known about this.

[willstott]

Acresso was spun out of Macrovision as a private equity deal and so there's a lot of pressure for them to make money. Unfortunately, its seems that they are focusing on short term profits at the expense of long term relationships.

For example, customers who fell for last week's heavily promoted 10% discount for buying v14 must be feeling pretty sick now that v15 has been announced (unless of course they also bought an expensive maintenance package). Removing the standalone build utility from the standard product is yet another example of short termism by Acresso.

I've been using InstallShield for 20+ years and promote it in my book (VSTS - Better Software Development for Agile Teams, Addison-Wesley, 2007). I would like Acresso to make a real success out of InstallShield, but upon present performance the management seem to have lost their way. Customers should make sure their views are heard. Therefore if you're not happy, write and complain!

[willstott]

Acresso was spun out of Macrovision as a private equity deal and so there's a lot of pressure for them to make money. Unfortunately, its seems that they are focusing on short term profits at the expense of long term relationships.

For example, customers who fell for last week's heavily promoted 10% discount for buying v14 must be feeling pretty sick now that v15 has been announced (unless of course they also bought an expensive maintenance package). Removing the standalone build utility from the standard product is yet another example of this sort of short termism by Acresso; i.e. let's maximise this quarter's sales even it means losing some customers who might continue buy our product over the next 20 years.

I've been using InstallShield for 20+ years and promote it in my book (VSTS - Better Software Development for Agile Teams, Addison-Wesley, 2007). I would like Acresso to make a real success out of InstallShield, but upon present performance the management seem to have lost their way. Customers should make sure their views are heard. Therefore I echo Christopher Painter's comment: if you're not happy, write and complain!

[TheTraveler]

I agree with you, but let us be fair about this. Agresso has for the past couple of versions honored the long term customers the ability to download the standalone building portion of the product. It is only to the new customers who only get the professional version that they are not supplying it to and only supplying it to the premier version of the product. So this thread here is asking the question, "Is Agresso still going to honor the past agreement with its long term customers with the new version of Install Shield?"

[Christopher_Pai]

It's been suggested by a coworker that I speak to in house counsel regarding the terms of our maintenance agreement. I'm hoping to not have to go down that road. It seems that we had to do that when IBM bought BuildForge and the results were very favorable.

[JeffGreenwald]

When InstallShield 12 was released in June 2006, it was announced that the Standalone Build would be packaged only with the InstallShield Premier Edition. In preparation for that release, we recognized that some users may need additional time to upgrade to the Premier Edition. Therefore, accommodations were made for a certain subset of the InstallShield 12 Professional users, granting them access to the InstallShield 12 Standalone Build module as part of that release. Now that two years have passed, and multiple releases have entered the market, the transition is being completed.


The Standalone Build functionality continues to be packaged with the Premier Edition in InstallShield 2009. The Standalone Build module can coexist with other versions of InstallShield, and you can run it from the command line. Each full license of InstallShield Premier Edition includes 10 Standalone Build modules.

Thanks,

[Christopher_Pai]

Jeff-

The huge, and I mean huge problem I have with this is that we prepaid our maintenance fees in good faith that Acresso would fulfill their end of the bargain. Instead you've taken the position that functionality can be taken away and expect us to spend even more money to get it back.

This is a huge black eye for Acresso and it will not go unnoticed by your customers.

[rchand445]

JeffGreenwald wrote:
When InstallShield 12 was released in June 2006, it was announced that the Standalone Build would be packaged only with the InstallShield Premier Edition. In preparation for that release, we recognized that some users may need additional time to upgrade to the Premier Edition. Therefore, accommodations were made for a certain subset of the InstallShield 12 Professional users, granting them access to the InstallShield 12 Standalone Build module as part of that release. Now that two years have passed, and multiple releases have entered the market, the transition is being completed.


The Standalone Build functionality continues to be packaged with the Premier Edition in InstallShield 2009. The Standalone Build module can coexist with other versions of InstallShield, and you can run it from the command line. Each full license of InstallShield Premier Edition includes 10 Standalone Build modules.

Thanks,

In effect, two years ago you downgraded the product to a number of long term users who held maintenance contracts. This feature used to be freely available as part of the purchase of Installshield. A vast number of us built automated build processes which depend on the standalone build module. Then you issue Installshield 12 and decide to force us to spend $2000 extra for the same functionality? I'm sorry, but something is wrong with this thinking. There are other products on the market which allow command line builds which are far less expensive than this offering.

[Christopher_Pai]

One that I'm aware of is free, open source, and rapidly reaching a point where it'll be a viable alternative. Now doesn't strike me as a good time to be upsetting the user community.

[Qingsong]

I am long time InstallShield user since IS3. But I am getting more and more parionoid. Each year we spend almost $1000 just for some functions which have been implemented by community or my own customization. SAB is only the feature which keeps me using IS.

I am currently using IS 2008 professional. There is no patches since its release even though there are a lot of issues, which has been fixed in 2009.

Only hot fix released for IS 2008 is the licensing registration. :mad:

The technical support is really slow repsonse for the feature/fix requests. One of the example is .NET 2.0 SP1 release. It took me less then 30 mintues to create a new .NET 2.0 SP1 pre-requisite. I do not understand why IS can not release/update this run-time officially.

Bottom line: If there is no SAB in IS 2009 professional, I will definitely not upgrade and will begin to looking for other tools instead.

Please re-consider spending $2000 just for SAB feature, which should be the standard feature anyway.

:mad: :mad:

[rchand445]

Business Definition for: Customer Relations

The approach of an organization to winning and retaining customers.
The most critical activity of any organization wishing to stay in business
is its approach to dealing with its customers. Putting customers at the center
of all activities is seen by many as an integral part of quality, pricing, and product differentiation.
On one level, customer relations means keeping customers fully informed, turning complaints into opportunities,
and genuinely listening to customers
- - http://dictionary.bnet.com/definition/customer+relations.html

[Christopher_Pai]

Qingsong wrote:
Bottom line: If there is no SAB in IS 2009 professional, I will definitely not upgrade and will begin to looking for other tools instead.

I agree. The problem is for maintenance subscribers who put their faith in InstallShield and pre-paid for the upgrade. The result is a meaningless ugrade since you there is no point in rolling out IS2009 if you can't roll it out to your build farm also.

[nitsev]

JeffGreenwald wrote:
When InstallShield 12 was released in June 2006, it was announced that the Standalone Build would be packaged only with the InstallShield Premier Edition. In preparation for that release, we recognized that some users may need additional time to upgrade to the Premier Edition. Therefore, accommodations were made for a certain subset of the InstallShield 12 Professional users, granting them access to the InstallShield 12 Standalone Build module as part of that release. Now that two years have passed, and multiple releases have entered the market, the transition is being completed.

Jeff,

You just don't get it. You don't REMOVE functionality from a product with an upgrade. If the SAB had been in the Premier Edition to begin with it would have been fine, but you decided to simply move it without any notice to get more money from your most loyal users. There is nothing in the Premier Edition that I need (multi-language support, repositories etc.) but a SAB is crucial for any install software and should not require the Premier Edition (which also was your original decision with IS 12). The software and maintenance fees are expensive as it is. If you cannot make enough money enough from this without treating your loyal customers like this you're in the wrong business.

[LanceRas]

I've had features removed with upgrades before. Many times a "better way" was found to do something, so they eliminated the other way.

While I would just assume being able to have the license for standalone, I understand Acresso's position (I don't have to like it). I just think things could have been made a bit clearer when a decision was made to finally pull the plug for the pro. Even better would be a limited promotion for those with pro to move up "due to the elimination of the standalone".

[nitsev]

LanceRas wrote:
I've had features removed with upgrades before. Many times a "better way" was found to do something, so they eliminated the other way.

While I would just assume being able to have the license for standalone, I understand Acresso's position (I don't have to like it). I just think things could have been made a bit clearer when a decision was made to finally pull the plug for the pro. Even better would be a limited promotion for those with pro to move up "due to the elimination of the standalone".

If you can think of a "better way" to do a standalone build without the SAB please share it with the community. They removed functionality without replacing it or notifying existing customers. They want all Pro users to move to the Premier edition although many users don't want or need the few extra features in the Premier edition, plus the BIG extra price tag. I for one can definitely NOT understand Acressos decision. This will hurt their business way more than leaving the SAB in the Pro edition. Remember, this would only apply for existing customers with valid maintenance agreements. New customers would have to buy the Premier Edition the get the SAB anyway.

[LanceRas]

nitsev,

I certainly don't work for or necessarily agree with how things were done by Acresso/Macrovision.

I will say this. They didn't advertise that IS2009 Pro would have SAB nor did they promise that pre-IS2009 Pro customers would have SAB. If they did, I didn't see it.

Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on point of view), the marketing department keeps pretty mum about features (or lack of) for the upcoming version until it pretty much is released. It's not like several companies which announce a new product 1-3 months ahead of time and announce some or all of the new goodies or clarify things that change like SAB.

In terms of SAB... I've only tried using it for a while and it doesn't fit my model needs. Having Pro and then a quality utility like FinalBuilder work with it is all I need.

In terms of maintenance agreements, I don't really see how that is relevant, unless it names the SAB as part of the agreement seperatly. My Pro maintenance agreement lets me call support and gets me any Pro edition of IS that comes out, features inclusive. Since IS2009 Pro doesn't feature SAB, then that I don't see how interpretation of the support maintenance states that I continue with SAB.

Don't get me wrong. I would just assume to get all the features I possibly can with my agreements.

It's just that the only fault I see is maybe Acresso/Macrovision not making more of an effort to clarify its position on the SAB and that at worst, communication should have been made to the existing maintenance holders that the SAB which was previously grandfathered in, is now officially off the table. This also should have been done within a reasonable time from when the decision to remove the SAB to prevent the appearance of bait and switch tacticts for those who were up for renewel recently.

[Christopher_Pai]

Using a tool like FinalBuilder/FinalBuilderServer/MSBuild/NAnt/TFS TeamBuild/CruiseControl et al ( trust me, I've used all of them ) doesn't eliminate the need for the stand alone build engine. Put simply, production builds should not be performed on a developers box. They should be performed on a build machine and their should likely be several build boxes in your farm for performance and availability purposes. Kinda like setting up a RAID instead of a single drive.

Without the SAB, you'd have to have a fully licensed copy of IS Pro for each one of those build agents. That is cost prohibitive. With the stand alone build you are covered for 10 machines per entitlement. That's ample.

Now I don't believe that SAB should EVER come off the table for maintenance customers who stay current. The fact of the matter is at some point they paid money for a product and pre-paid ( over and over ) for upgrades. These are the most committed customers. To take a critical feature out of their tier and move it into a higher tier is clearly bad customer service and quite possibly violates the maintenance agreement.

[LanceRas]

Chris,

My Installshield install is only on a machine that does builds or doing development in terms of the Installshield development. I do agree with you in terms of application development. If you want to isolate even from the development of the installers, than I can see your point, although I don't necessarily follow it.

I think the main thing we all seem to agree on is that the decision pertaining to the SAB and the pro edition for IS2009 has not cast a light favorably to Acresso as the new company in charge to their regular customers. It just didn't make good PR. New customers or those not on maintenance, it's moot.

I go back to my statement in that knowing that this would probably ruffle feathers, there should have been notification to maintenance holders at the pro level regarding this change prior to release. This would not have divulged anything planned for IS2009.

I'd have to look more closely to the maintenance agreement. So far, looking back through the several years being on maintenance (since IS X, I believe), I'm just not seeing where SAB is named specifically or that it is permanently grandfathered in.

I'm sure you're probably looking at it a lot harder, as your level of usage and development is in a different league than me.

And again, don't get me wrong. I'm not rooting for IS to kill SAB for Pro. It's just that I'm not seeing any foul play... just not a very popular decision and poor management of handling this decision.