Basic Operation of WiXAware is centered around what many will see as a familiar and easy to follow GUI interface. Click the simply named area of interest on the left and the form for managing that aspect of the setup is provided in the center frame. For example, if you wanted to add a new feature, you would simply click "Features and Components" from the project explorer treeview and then right-click in the main document area to choose "add new feature".

In fact, adding most anything to your WiX product begins with a right-click. Also worth noting is that WiXAware makes minimal use of dialog boxes. A property grid is used (often in a third, left pane) to provide details on any selected item for which you want to enter specifics. This does make the layout a bit wider than you might be used to, but windows can easily be set to auto-hide and will then slide in and out as you need them. In most cases, the property grid values are drop-down menus that allow you to simply choose a value (you don't need to know what options are available).

However, when you do enter text, a Localized String Editor is presented. This lets you very easily make use of properties, paths and other information already established in your project.

WiXAware is also helpful in that it does not do things like create features and components automatically. If you add something to your project, you'll be prompted to create a feature first. Then when you add something, you'll be asked in which component should it be included (where you can also very easily create a new component to put it in).

As a WiX tool, the thing that will interest many people is the XML tab in the document area...