Why does Orca change MSI's "Date Modified" value?
Hello all,
I use Orca to have a quick boo at alot of MSIs, rarely to edit them. Something that I've noticed recently that I find kind of disturbing is that for many (but not all) MSIs, when I open them with Orca just to look at it - making no changes - and then close it, the Date Modified value of the MSI file changes (to the time when I close it). I'm pretty sure it's not changing anything in the MSI at all - I mean, the size stays the exactly the same - but why it does this I don't know. I've noticed it predominantly (or maybe only) on Microsoft MSIs. I want my vendor MSIs to keep their Date Modified value where possible. I find comparing the timestamp of two MSIs is a reliable and quick way to determine if they are infact identical.
I googled a bit on this and can't find anything - if any of you have any ideas I'd love to hear them.
-Kyle
I use Orca to have a quick boo at alot of MSIs, rarely to edit them. Something that I've noticed recently that I find kind of disturbing is that for many (but not all) MSIs, when I open them with Orca just to look at it - making no changes - and then close it, the Date Modified value of the MSI file changes (to the time when I close it). I'm pretty sure it's not changing anything in the MSI at all - I mean, the size stays the exactly the same - but why it does this I don't know. I've noticed it predominantly (or maybe only) on Microsoft MSIs. I want my vendor MSIs to keep their Date Modified value where possible. I find comparing the timestamp of two MSIs is a reliable and quick way to determine if they are infact identical.
I googled a bit on this and can't find anything - if any of you have any ideas I'd love to hear them.
-Kyle
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Posted by:
AngelD
17 years ago
Never heard of this, does this happen if you open the MSI through ORCA in Read-Only mode?
Open ORCA (without any MSI) and then Tools -> Options -> Database tab
Set to Read-Only
Drag'n drop the MSI on ORCA and close
Open ORCA (without any MSI) and then Tools -> Options -> Database tab
Set to Read-Only
Drag'n drop the MSI on ORCA and close
Posted by:
fosteky
17 years ago
Thanks Kim,
Your advice worked perfectly.
Per your advice, opened Orca and went to Tools>Options>Database and I set both the "Read Only Recommended" and the "Read Only Enforced" fields to a value of Read Only (default values for Orca are evidently Read/Write). Now I can open MSIs to have a boo using Orca without changing them at all, and on those rare occasions when I want to direct edit an MSI with Orca I can just switch those fields back.
-Kyle
Your advice worked perfectly.
Per your advice, opened Orca and went to Tools>Options>Database and I set both the "Read Only Recommended" and the "Read Only Enforced" fields to a value of Read Only (default values for Orca are evidently Read/Write). Now I can open MSIs to have a boo using Orca without changing them at all, and on those rare occasions when I want to direct edit an MSI with Orca I can just switch those fields back.
-Kyle
Posted by:
aogilmor
17 years ago
i've noticed the same thing. looks like the default is to open read/write, but that doesn't explain why it has to update the file modified date even if you haven't made any changes! Also, read-only mode doesn't let you select/copy values, ahd that really sux. one reason I like opening MSI files with it Orca is that it's quick, even with big MSI files where Wise can be slow.
so often what I do is make a copy for "taking a boo" (changing the file modified date shouldn't affect the functionality of the MSI, but I agree with you....I don't like it).
Lately I've been working with a lot of picky vendor installations where Orca worked better than Wise. Wise does a lot "under the hood" that you can't see and sometimes that can mess up the install. And yes, I tried using a transform first [:D]
so often what I do is make a copy for "taking a boo" (changing the file modified date shouldn't affect the functionality of the MSI, but I agree with you....I don't like it).
Lately I've been working with a lot of picky vendor installations where Orca worked better than Wise. Wise does a lot "under the hood" that you can't see and sometimes that can mess up the install. And yes, I tried using a transform first [:D]
Posted by:
AngelD
17 years ago
Okey so it seems that I may have lied when I said that I've never seen/heard about this problem before. I really didn't know this.
Thanks for telling us/me about this issue.
I guess you would have to either pre-configure to open in Read-Only mode or have a copy of the original MSI.
on those rare occasions when I want to direct edit an MSI with Orca
Soon enuf you will use ORCA more then ever to create/modify your MSI/Transform [8D]
Thanks for telling us/me about this issue.
I guess you would have to either pre-configure to open in Read-Only mode or have a copy of the original MSI.
on those rare occasions when I want to direct edit an MSI with Orca
Soon enuf you will use ORCA more then ever to create/modify your MSI/Transform [8D]
Posted by:
AngelD
17 years ago
Regarding my answer about Read-Only mode seems only to work if the MSI is flagged as Read-Only.
The easiest way to preserve the Modified date is from within ORCA open the MSI (NOT drag'n drop) and select the "Open as read-only" box.
The easiest way to preserve the Modified date is from within ORCA open the MSI (NOT drag'n drop) and select the "Open as read-only" box.
Posted by:
nheim
17 years ago
Hi folks,
one easy way to do this in an elegant manner would be, to install MakeMsi from Dennis Bareis. It puts a 'View with Orca' entry in the context-menu of all the related file-extension (msi, msm .....). This is done with a VBS script, which, befor starting Orca, puts the file in RO-mode, opens it and removes the RO after closing. One could also just use his script (OrcaView.VBS) and install it by hand. I use it for quite while now and use it a lot.
With this behaviour, maybe ORCA is telling us, that we are in fact, playing around with a database. ;-)
Regards, Nick
one easy way to do this in an elegant manner would be, to install MakeMsi from Dennis Bareis. It puts a 'View with Orca' entry in the context-menu of all the related file-extension (msi, msm .....). This is done with a VBS script, which, befor starting Orca, puts the file in RO-mode, opens it and removes the RO after closing. One could also just use his script (OrcaView.VBS) and install it by hand. I use it for quite while now and use it a lot.
With this behaviour, maybe ORCA is telling us, that we are in fact, playing around with a database. ;-)
Regards, Nick
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