DRM Activation Question

ShadowWolf recently commented:

Activation ( and reactivation ) are pretty par for the course in the business tool world from what I've seen. I don't know that anyone really "likes" it, but it definitely serves a legitimate purpose.

This comment made me wonder, is this true? I work in an environment with airgaps around our network connections for security purposes and I can't think of a single tool that we use besides InstallShield that requires activation and/or reactivation.

Sure, Windows does (once) but they also offer a volume license key that doesn't require activation. Microsoft Office works the same way. Visual Studio, TFS and so on. Even our IBM/Rational products don't give us this problem and trust me, those are some pretty darn expensive tools. The only product that we use that I can think of is Robohelp.

So I'm curious, what are some of the products my readers use that require activation?

InstallShield 2010 vs WiX 3.0

It's been no secret that I've favored InstallShield over WiX for many years. I've used InstallShield products since 1997 and I've shipped hundreds of installers using this versatile tool. InstallScript, XML Locator, Setup Prerequisites, Multiple Instance Support, COM Extraction, MySQL, Dialog/Control editors, Product/Release configurations and Component authoring wizards/views have made me a very productive and profitable person over the years.

Unfortunatly, there are also things I dislike about InstallShield. The DRM activation ( and now reactivation with IS2010 ) is horrible, difficulty in trying to get updates in an offline scenario (which we always are for security purposes), the random crashes, the horrible DTD/XML transformation, sequenced primary keys and of course, the removal of the stand alone build from Professional and totally useless collaboration tool combined with the really high price of the product.

If I'm hurting anyones feelings, I'm sorry. It's hard for me too since I've used this tool for so long and I do believe it's still a very good tool for many development shops. Just not for mine.

At my day job, I lead a team of 4 ( going on 6! ) setup developers. We collectively maintain dozens of installs that generate and consume hundreds of merge modules from a software product line. Our typical installer ships 10,000 - 15,000 files and includes countless databases, services, webservices and many chained packages of programs that we integrate with. All of this occurs on many active branches.

Unfortunatly InstallShield with it's DTD XML and incremented primary keys just doesn't work well in this environment. Merging branches back together in clearcase is a nightmare since you always end up with unresolved conflicts. Enter WiX. The XSD XML is 95% smaller then DTD XML and is way more expressive. Also thanks to deterministically unique primary keys and guids, changes done on multiple branches can actually merge back together easily.

The problem with WiX of course is the lack of gui designer abstractions and visualizations. Fortunatly I finally have a solution for that. I've recently had an internal tools developer assigned to me to come up with our own collaboration tools to sit on top of votive. Once complete we are hoping to once again try decentralized setup development. I'm not sure it'll work ( it didn't last time ) but we are going to give it a try again. The reality is our environment is growing so fast that we need to retool and try new strategies to keep up. Hiring more and more people just doesn't seem to work anymore.

Now Hiring - Austin, TX

I'm looking for an experienced InstallShield / MSI / WiX / BuildForge / TFS / C# software engineer to join my team in Southwest Austin, TX. The engineer will be part of a Build and Install team that currently consists of 8 members with 3 more on the way to meet our ever growing needs.

Please contact me at chrpai@deploymentengineering.com if you are interested.

Please note, due to customer requirements, all applicants must be a US citizen. Ability to obtain and maintain a US Security Clearance is required; an active clearance is highly desirable.

Trip Down Memory Lane

I don't talk about this much these days, but before my career in computers I was once a musician. From 1993 to 1996, I was assigned for duty with "The Commandant's Own" United States Marine Drum and Bugle Corps. It was quite an honor to have earned the privilege to tour with such an outstanding group.

Those were some really great years of my life. Thanks to Facebook, I'm able to keep in touch with my former fellow Marines and in June we'll be having a 75th anniversary reunion in Washington, DC.

So turn up your speakers and press play for a trip down memory lane.

WiX DTF Mystery Solved

Last October a (then) former ( and now current ) coworker also named Chris asked me the following in an email:

I am running into a problem with a DTF custom action. When the action tries to run I get:

"SFXCA: Failed to create new CA process via RUNDLL32."

This on is weird because I am using the exact same module in another product on the same machine and it works like a champ. Bizarre.

My initial reply was:

Are any CA's running before it?

I hadn't seen this error before and I was a little concerned because I was such a proponent of DTF and managed custom actions I was afraid that perhaps DTF had an Achilles' heel. I also knew that where my friend worked was the home of a very restrictive environment so if anyone would find a problem with DTF, it would be him!

I introduced Chris to the creator of DTF, Jason Ginchereau, and the two attempted to troubleshoot the problem with little progress. I didn't really follow up on it because at the time I was busy cranking through sprints for a new product at Multimedia Games.

Fast forward five months and I'm working with Chris again refactoring build automation, creating installation tools and writing custom actions for installs. Suddenly the ugly RUNDLL problem rears it's head again only this time it's MY problem because I'm now the install team lead and I'm always saying how good DTF is.

Rats.

So I email Jason again and log a bug (SF210297) at SourceForge to make sure it gets proper attention this time. This time Jason sees some problems on the unmanaged side of DTF. He was assuming that the current working directory of the recycled process hadn't been mucked with ( remember my comment about other CA's scheduled prior? ) when he made his call to RUNDLL32.

So to make a long story short, I just completed an effort with the build team today to update 30 some virtual machines to have WiX 3.0.5210.0. Between this bug fix and many others related to DTF, I really suggest that anyone using DTF custom actions in builds prior to 5210 upgrade ASAP and don't ship your product until you do. You might never come across this problem but I know I sleep better knowing I won't either now also.

InstallAware Email Thread ... Is this for real?

I came across a very interesting email thread that is really far out there. I almost want to believe it's a fake but having dealt with InstallAware and Michael Nesmith in the past, I can only conclude that it's legit.

You can read the exchange here at CodeProject.com.

When You Wish Upon A Star

When you wish upon a star
Makes no difference who you are
Anything your heart desires
Will come to you

Wow, have they grown fast! It seems like just yesterday that Ashley and Emma was born.

When you have a 4 year old and a 6 year old who both are princesses, there's only place you can go for vacation... it's simply time to visit the mouse.

Anyone have tips for a first-timer? We'll be going in May before Memorial day.

Wish me luck! :-)