Software Deployment

Interesting. From what I just (briefly) read they are only supporting App-V format so as long as this is what you are going for then it sounds sensible. Certainly not aware that Wise are supporting this (hardly surprising since they are trying to promote SVS). I guess it really depends on how good the conversion tools are.

App-V comes which it's own sequencing client and I believe that already supports MSI - althout I'm not sure to what degree. I'd assume new apps would be done in the App-V sequencer, but for converting existing MSI, this InstallShield option maybe good...

Let us know how you get on!

Cheers,
Rob.

from what I've read at the web the AdminStudio product is really good..unfortunately have no experience with this product myself.
" ...


Top 5 benefits of using AdminStudio 9
Increase ROI
AdminStudio brings a greater return on investment as it frees up the time of IT staff and increases productivity through providing reliable installs of applications.
Save Time
AdminStudio’s automated tools help to cut packaging time by up to 70% and with AdminStudio’s 99% deployment success rate you can be sure that once an application is repackaged it will install on any Windows Operating System and not require repacking for Vista.
Standardise
Because AdminStudio can produce MSI installer files from any application, your organisation can standardise on this format thus improving reliability and manageability.
Virtualise
As AdminStudio can create virtual packages for App-V, ThinApp and XenApp that can deploy without conflict, it simplifies the move to virtualisation and doesn’t require existing applications to be repackaged.
Manage
AdminStudio Enterprise and Professional include the Application Catalog which is a database containing information on all packages created in your organisation. Numerous reports can be generated from the information giving IT a key oversight into application management and deployment.
.." [/align]source: http://www.greymatter.com/product/AdminStudio/325824[/align] [/align]

Irrespective of virtualisation, as I believe I've said before, take a look at the Symantec Connect system's Wise Packaging forum (if you can bear it - it's truly the most appalling system). There are a couple of threads there which, if you read them carefully, tell you all you need to know about the future development of Wise.

This topic interests me currently as I'm consulting at a company that bought Wise but is thinking about switching to Installshield. VBScab, can you summarize the discussion or provide a link?
Thanks.

https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/forums/will-we-ever-see-support-win-2008-or-sql-server-2008

You'll need to sign up to see the content, I think. You then get to enjoy what Symantec believes is a leading-edge forum/discussion experience...

Thanks VBScab.

I noticed that Installshield has support for Windows 7 / WI5 now, but Wise has announced nothing (that I can find).

If you follow the link in post 6. And follow that thread on the lovely Symantec forums you'll find an offer from Michael Grueber (Senior Product Manager) to arrange a run through of the Wise Package Studio Roadmap.

I did and will be arranging my telephone conference with him shortly.

You need to sign a non disclosure form though so my lips are sealed...

Yeah, I've email him earlier and am waiting for a response. He'd best get back to me soon because the meeting about ditching Wise is this afternoon.

When his competitor is already supporting 2 year old products, what's the big secret?!? I don't give a toss about roadmaps. All I want (sorry, "wanted") to know is (was), are they developing the product or not?

I have a call with this fellow fairly soon. His responsiveness is very good at least.

Installshield is clearly ahead when it comes to supporting the latest features of Windows Installer.

I noticed they are supporting patch supersedence (4.5) in last years release.

In saying that what they mean by support is they have a tick box that adds a value into a components attribute column. If this is what you need as support then support they have. But the reality is you could say that Orca supports WI5 as well.

Wise is well behind on that kind of support for new features and such.

I have looked at the IS virtualisation support and it is very very limited. I don't believe there is any GOOD products on the market that are supporting this well.

What IS refers to as support for the virtualization products is a utility that converts an MSI to a virtual solution without any user input. This has batch support for converting multiple MSI's to virtual solutions. (a nice feature)

This works for App-V, ThinApp and one other I can't recall at this point.

All that said and done IS is clearly in front of anyone else relating to this kind of support. But the reality is the product is very very immature and has got some considerable hurdles it needs to overcome before its a good product.

The new desktop deployment literature from Microsoft pushes AdminStudio pretty heavily. They make one passing reference to Wise in one slide, the rest is all AdminStudio links and examples.
Microsoft is offering a stripped down version of AdminStudio for free from its site as well.

a stripped down version of AdminStudio...[waits for response from John McF, wondering how much more stripped-down it could be] LOL

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/configmgr/bb932316.aspx

Doesn't include the editor, so you'd need to use Orca to author custom actions or make any other significant changes.

It's free, you can't really complain about that.

lol i don't mind IS that much it would just appear that was as I don't do it any favours when comparing it to others.

Long time wise user here. I moved to Wise when SMS Installer could no longer support my scripting needs. Now I'm ready to move to something else because Wise is on my nerves. It's the only product I have had issues with under Windows 7 (but the problems existed in Vista too) and I just can't see buying a license for 2 new people coming onboard for a product that's 3 years old. I rarely use WFWI to create an MSI. I'll crack open one to get some info or modify from time to time, but only if i have an inhouse app or total repackage needs do I go there. I've never been a subscriber of repackaging the world. Why reinvent the wheel when setup.exe /s works fine? I have done thousands of installations using wise script and just don't find the need for the MSI creation.

That being said, The move to App-V has be intrigued from the IS perspective as that could potentially save some time. Whether or not it's the right move, I'm not sure. I read through the thread VBscab pointed out and also sent Mike an email. I'm just not holding my breath about a new product. What ocmpany wouldn't have SOME information posted about an update that's 3 years in the making? I mean by this time, the programming language has evolved 5 times! Do they keep rewriting it in the hopes that it will get better each time a new Visual Studio is released?

So.. I'm curious. If Wise did a new release of Package Studio, what enhancements and fixes would you like to see?

Obviously Windows 7 / Windows Installer v5 / 64-bit support is a given. Can't see support for App-V etc coming along since they have their own 'solution' with SVS.

Couple of fixes I can think of for starters... don't populate selfreg by default for setup captures, fix the ICE validation errors which WPS7 always creates, and sort out the capture reports to show before values for registry entries that were modified. We are running SP2 so forgive me if any are fixed in SP3.

Would be nice to see the Wise standard merge modules sorted out (validation errors / selfreg entries etc) but I guess this is a non starter since the current ones have been out for ages.

Anymore for anymore?

Cheers,
Rob.

all i have to say is...wobbo!!!!

Well certainly something I want to see fixed in IS is the rubbish way it chucks stuff into a Registry_HKLM key. I dont care if it doesnt know what to do with a class or progid, so doesnt use the relevant tables, but I do care that it puts them into the correct components!

So annoying having 5000 registry keys in a component which I then have to sort through! If they insist on doing this then let me right click on a registry key and go "move to component", then i would kiss their phat boots!

P

fix the ICE validation errors which WPS7 always creates...which it's done since v5 so, on a scale of likelihood, one to ten, what do you imagine the chances are for this one? The words "oink" and "flap" come to mind...

1thing also on my wishlist. If someone found these function in the recent version of wise let me know.

-When making a snapshot and meet during the process a file is in use that the file copy action will not be cut off. As alternative it wil nicely copy all the files except the one in use and report about it so you can add them later when editing the wsi.

Other ones:
-Support of virtualisation tools. i think when they do not do it in the feature "they starting to dig there grave"
-Possibility to add 3th party plugins. When symantec doenst want to support other virtualisation solutions when do not give the tools to build the support.