I am happy to declare that the WiX toolset is now at Development Status: 5 - Production/Stable. I have had a few people urging this upgrade in status for a while so about a week ago Joe and I did the required project maintenance to get the right bits (v2.0.5805.0) posted to the right places on SourceForge. Everything seems to be working so I'm finally comfortable posting publicly on my blog.
The upgrade in status is recognition that the WiX v2.0.5805.0 toolset has been stable and unchanged for over four months and before that had a year of very minor stabilizing bug fixes. Of course, the WiX v3 toolset is still under development where some builds are better than others but we're generally trending towards goodness at the end of the year.
So in summary.
WiX v2 - Production/Stable (v2.0.5805.0)
WiX v3 - Beta (latest v3.0.3815.0 and climbing)
Trending towards goodness? That’s a very modern phrase. If a WiX v3 build becomes available that is known to have lots more ‘goodness’ and very little ‘badness’ then I’d advocate getting it onto the SourceForge download page. It is clear that many people using WiX v3 only look as far as that location to get WiX v3. If people were generally looking to the weekly builds then the demand for WiX 3.0.2925.0 would have declined by now. However, the statistics suggest that the demand is fairly constant:
http://sourceforge.net/project/stats/detail.php?group_id=105970&ugn=wix&type=prdownload&mode=12months&package_id=168888&release_id=511175
The cost of refreshing the SourceForge download page is the administrative time required to prepare the package. However, that should easily be outweighed by the benefit of having a far greater number of people using and feeding back on the latest WiX v3 builds.
By the way, I wonder if a refresh of the SourceForge download page was tried in January with 3.0.3711.0, but later withdrawn:
http://sourceforge.net/project/stats/detail.php?group_id=105970&ugn=wix&type=prdownload&mode=12months&package_id=168888&release_id=569093
The above web addresses might be truncated when shown on a narrow display. If you don’t see “&release_id=511175” and “&release_id=569093” at the end of each respectively then the web addresses have been truncated. If that is the case then try switching to Elastic Layout or go to the SourceForge statistics page and select Downloads. The two graphs I’m referring to are:
Time Period: Last 12 Months
Package: WiX v3 (beta)
Release: 3.0.2925.0
File: All Files
and:
Time Period: Last 12 Months
Package: WiX v3 (beta)
Release: 3.0.3711.0
File: All Files
- Just wish WiX.chm worked now (having overwritten the old version with the 'stable' one)
- Just wish I could type in here without a browser error message at every character
- Just wish I knew what this meant:
light.exe : error LGHT0216 : An unexpected Win32 exception with error code 0x654 occurred:
This installation package could not be opened.
Contact the application vendor to verify that this is a valid Windows Installer package
-- After two full days of thrashing around in this shambles of versions and incorrect documentation I have given up on WiX, so really I don't care anymore.
PC
Peter, I'm sorry you've hit issues. If you do check back, I would greatly appreciate more details about the issues you are seeing. Note I am talking about WiX v2.0.5805.0:
- I do not have any problem opening the WiX.chm file from the binaries.zip nor the Votive.msi. It is possible you are hitting an issue where HTML Help files downloaded from the internet are not trusted. Right click on the .chm file and in Properties there should be a button or check box to "trust" the HTML help file.
- There are a few bugs in the Javascript on my blog. Sorry about that. When I get time, I'll look into debugging (no time soon). You can get the error to not pop-up constantly by changing your browser settings to not prompt for every scripting error.
- For the LGHT0216 error, there should be more information dumped after the message. That information would be very helpful in debugging what you are hitting. Often we see that type of error when a virus scanner is locking the files the WiX toolset is creating (.cab files are particularly troublesom). Disabling the scanning from your build drive and TEMP (or WIX_TEMP) folder typical eliminates this problem.
- Again, sorry you've had troubles. We try to fix all of the issues that arise but do need some help knowing what needs fixing.
Hope to get bug reports back from you on the issue and if not, well, best of luck with your next tool of choice.
Does the fact that WiX v2 is stable mean you will be spending more time on getting WiX v3 stable / fixing it's bugs?
It is perfectly useable in VS2005 but I can't use it in VS2008 because of the bug: "1914213 Can't open project with WixUIExtension dependency."
ps. WiX has meant so much to us... thanks a million for all your hard work!
I can't install v2.0.5805.0. I have VS 2008, but get an error that says "Wix toolset Visual Studio Package requires the Standard, Professional, or Team editions of Visual Studio; Express editions are not supported.". Any ideas on how I can get past this error?
I get the same error as Dave Horne above
I have VSTS 2008, but error says "Wix toolset Visual Studio Package requires the Standard, Professional, or Team editions of Visual Studio; Express editions are not supported."
So I can't install v2.0.5805.0, only the 3.0 beta
Unfortunately, Votive in WiX v2 does not support VS 2008.
I want to use WIX Beta. Can I use this Beta straight away or can I use only Stable(V2.0). I read from some websites that VS08 and Office 2007 install uses this WIX 3.0 is this right information??
You can use whatever version of the WiX toolset you want.
I believe Office2007 used WiX v2 and VS08 used WiX v3.
Hi,
I have one Merge Module (MSM) created using WISE which I want to use it in WIX.
When I created MSI using WIX which contains the above MSM and RUN the MSI then the Service EXE and the related DLL's are copied to my system Folder but the service is not Installed and started in my system.
But when I do the same steps mentioned above with WISE ( Created MSI which contains MSM) then the service is Installed and Started in my system.
Is there anything extra I need to do it in WIX in order to Install and Start the Service?
Thanks,
Narasimha.
Where can i find out sample and tutorial about WiX??
Rob,
I am trying to find a downloadable copy of version 3.0.2925.0 which is needed for WAI. It does not seem to be available on SourceForge and I can't find anyplace else to download it from. Can you assist? Many THanks in advance.