The ISWIX blog has moved to http://www.iswix.com/blog. All 379 previous articles from 2003 - 2017 will remain at this URL to make sure the content can be linked to from all over the web.
Christopher Painter's email address is also changing to chrpai@iswix.com.
Sincerely,
Christopher Painter
ISWIX, LLC.
Historical archive 2003-2016
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
Sunday, February 19, 2017
IsWiX Visual Studio 2017 Support Roadmap
I just wanted to put an FYI out there that IsWiX will not support Visual Studio 2017 at launch date. Microsoft has made substantial changes to the way VS is deployed and created a lot of complications for extension developers.
In order for IsWiX to function in VS 2 extensions need to be installed:
WiX Votive
IsWiX AddIn
The WiX votive is required to load .wixproj based projects in your solution and is the foundation for IsWiX's own multiproject solution templates.
The IsWiX AddIn is required to send a .wxs document to the IsWiX.exe.
WiX appears to be moving in the direction of removing Votive from their installer and shipping it separately via the VS marketplace. Assuming the work is completed (there is currently no ship date announced for v3.11.0) it will likely require the setup developer to do an additional installation step prior to being able to load an existing solution or create a new one.
As sub optimal as this is, it appears to be set in stone and I have no intention of spending any energy on IsWiX until I see the final landscape of what I have to deal with. I will likely do something similar to what they are doing or I might make a bootstrapper to automate installing WiX, the votive extension and the IsWiX AddIn extension.
FWIW, while this has been the worst, ever release of VS has caused pain for me as either a user of WiX or a user of InstallShield. It just takes time for this to catch up. For this reason I *ALWAYS* recommend keeping your application projects in one solution and your installer projects in another. This way you can ensure you won't be blocking your application developers from moving forward to the latest version of VS while you continue to compile against the tried and true version you've always used. They need to be cutting edge, we do not need to be.
In order for IsWiX to function in VS 2 extensions need to be installed:
WiX Votive
IsWiX AddIn
The WiX votive is required to load .wixproj based projects in your solution and is the foundation for IsWiX's own multiproject solution templates.
The IsWiX AddIn is required to send a .wxs document to the IsWiX.exe.
WiX appears to be moving in the direction of removing Votive from their installer and shipping it separately via the VS marketplace. Assuming the work is completed (there is currently no ship date announced for v3.11.0) it will likely require the setup developer to do an additional installation step prior to being able to load an existing solution or create a new one.
As sub optimal as this is, it appears to be set in stone and I have no intention of spending any energy on IsWiX until I see the final landscape of what I have to deal with. I will likely do something similar to what they are doing or I might make a bootstrapper to automate installing WiX, the votive extension and the IsWiX AddIn extension.
FWIW, while this has been the worst, ever release of VS has caused pain for me as either a user of WiX or a user of InstallShield. It just takes time for this to catch up. For this reason I *ALWAYS* recommend keeping your application projects in one solution and your installer projects in another. This way you can ensure you won't be blocking your application developers from moving forward to the latest version of VS while you continue to compile against the tried and true version you've always used. They need to be cutting edge, we do not need to be.
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