Rob Mensching's Blog - page 22

File this tidbit under documented but cryptic and missing an error message. I was recently creating 32-bit and 64-bit MSIs using the WiX toolset. The very helpful -arch command line switch to candle made it easy to build for both architectures with the same codebase. Maybe a little too easy.

In my previous blog post where I introduced some of the features of Burn the question whether Burn would work as a single self extracting executable was asked a few times. The answer is, "Of course!" but there is actually more to it than that.

It was almost ten years ago that I started a little project inside the firewalls of Microsoft called the WiX toolset. I called it a "Community Source" project because inside Microsoft the words "Open Source" only had negative connotations. I never would have guessed that 5 years later I would help reshape Microsoft's approach to Open Source by releasing my little project. Now 5 more years later, Microsoft takes another big step and contributes to the most famous Open Source project of all, Linux.

If you follow me on Twitter (@robmen), you know I've become a huge Seattle Sounders FC fan. I haven't played soccer since I was a kid but after K invited Jenny and I to a match early this season we became hooked. Now we're season ticket holders (jumped in when they opened more seats mid-season) and follow away games regularly.

A long while ago, Bob wrote a short blog entry about the WiX toolset's upcoming bootstrapper adoringly named Burn. We made some early progress back then but refocused our energy on finishing WiX v3.0 which recently released. Now I'm back to Burn which will release with WiX v3.5.

Now that the WiX v3 toolset is released, I thought I'd share a couple tips for those users upgrading from WiX v2. WiX v3 is obviously a major upgrade from WiX v2 and there are a few breaking changes as a result. Fortunately, WiX v3 ships with a tool to help with the code migration (WixCop.exe) and then you only need to understand one new concept (extensions).

It is my pleasure to announce that WiX toolset v3.0 is now officially declared Production/Stable. The final build number is 3.0.5419.0. You can download it from here or here.

Today, this very day, 10 years ago, before the new millennium, I joined Microsoft as a full time employee. I can remember sitting in NEO (New Employee Orientation) on my first day listening to instructions on what forms to sign where and later experienced employees spoke about tips on how to be successful at Microsoft. I don't remember the specifics of what was said. I just remember being so excited to get started writing code. For real.