PackageAware

I gave PackageAware a spin and as you may have guessed by its name, this is the suite's repackaging utility. It very kindly recommended running it as a stand-alone utility on a clean machine – and even recommended using VMWare or Virtual PC to optimize the capture process. To help enforce this concept, InstallAware Studio Admin actually opens the folder where this single executable utility sits instead of running it directly in the IDE.

The PackageAware for InstallAware utility presents a simple wizard and gives you the opportunity to specify what files and registry keys to exclude and what registry root keys you wish to include. Naturally, the defaults are extensive and will suit the needs of most users.

The system is scanned and shows you a count of registry values or files found, the total elapsed time and even a constantly updated rate of speed with which it is progressing in the form of how many files/registry entries per second (see image at right). Even on my relatively slow virtual machine the scan was perhaps the fastest I have seen. It completed quickly, and while the competing tools don’t provide this kind of information for comparison the numbers I saw were registry entries at up to about 6000 registry values per second and files as fast as 5000 per second.

Touted as a separate utility for running on another system, I was not surprised the wizard ended with saving a project file (*.mpr) which was not automatically opened in PackageAware. So it is by design that the packager is not not tightly integrated with the InstallAware IDE. When moving packages and sources from your test system to an InstallAware system, you can use the Refactor Paths tool to update paths in the captured project, if you choose to move the project files. If you are more comfortable creating packages directly on the local system as many other tools do, you can simply install InstallAware on the capture system.

All in all, InstallAware should have the competition watching closely. Just one or two of these features may be reason enough for many to make a switch, but more so is the simple focus of the tool. While InstallAware studio does not provide tools for scanning patches, detecting and resolving conflicts between packages, and package management; these can often become features that often go unused. Some competing tools have become so cumbersome and bloated that they are requiring some pretty hefty requirements (such as SQL and IIS). So, for those looking to develop powerful MSI packages without the need to spend months getting to know the Windows Installer SDK, InstallAware is possibly the best choice I have seen.

There are four editions available, from $199 to $1499 with a 33% discounts if you currently use InstallShield/ZeroG (Macrovision) or Wise (Altiris) products. A 30 day evaluation and pricing can be found here: http://www.installaware.com/buy-store.htm

Bob Kelly
7/2/2006
AppDeploy.com

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