Build Installer LV8.0 - is this real??

[becktho]

Hi Kennon

Yes, I unchecked DataSocket and it still is working. I know it is difficult to make a general installer because of the dependencies. I think it would be a great feature, if I was able to switch to some kind of advanced mode, where I saw a bit more detailed which drivers or sw is installed and where I could also uncheck some features. For instance in the setup.ini I saw eiter VXI or PXI, which I don't explicitly use. So I would uncheck this as there really is no need for it. But as I said - I know that it's quite difficult.

Coming to the Real-Time topic, I just can say you're right. I noticed the number of components installed and components uninstalled was different. So I'll install it again ;).

To double tst's comment, I just can say that it is highly appreciated to get a closer look at the "secrets of NI" ;).

Thanks for your great comments.

Thomas

[ChrisReed]

Having just started using LabVIEW 8.0 I am a bit apprehensive in using the new Installer. Why is a bare-bones installation (LabVIEW 8.0 Run-Time Installer) so huge - 80MB.  I just built an application in LabVIEW 7.0 and the whole thing was 16MB which included the 6MB executable file, Runtime Engine, 3D graph support and some support files (images, text etc.)?

[shoneill]

I just read this thread with great interest.

Does this mean that if I develop an application with Motion, Vision and VISA (Including named axes, named ports and so on) that EVERYTHING will be included in the installer?

No more defining virtual COM-port names when installing?

No more exporting and importing PID settings for motion controllers?

Sounds good and is actually a reason to upgrade.

What happens if there's already a version of something installed on the target system though?  How does the installer deal with version conflicts from different programs?

Shane.

[tst]

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@shoneill wrote:

What happens if there's already a version of something installed on the target system though?  How does the installer deal with version conflicts from different programs?

Shane.

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That's a great question. What happens if I install an application built in 8.0 (with FieldPoint 5) on a PC which already has another application built in 6.1 (which can't work with FP 5)? Will the 6.1 exe stop working?

[becktho]

After reading Shane's post - what happens if I reinstall the same program? Is the already existing application detected? How is this case handled?

[Kennon_Cotton]

Chris,

You're right the installer is rather large, but the LabVIEW 8.0 Run-Time Engine is a lot larger than the 7.1 one is.  You can download the 87MB LabVIEW 8.0 RTE installer here or the 33MB LabVIEW 7.1.1 RTE installer here.  That is quite a difference, but we've added a lot of features in 8.0, some of which require support in the Run-Time Engine, which means it gets bigger.  On the page to download the LabVIEW 8.0 Run-Time Engine installer you'll probably notice the 24MB download as well.  Basically it is the "bare minimum" RTE needed for Remote Panels in web browsers where as the 87MB download is the "Full" RTE, that includes DataSocket, ability to host Remote Panels, support for Analysis VIs, support for the Data Storage VIs (NI USI), and support for the new Shared Variable.

So the Installer you generated was 80 MB including 6MB for the executable and even though I pointed at the 87MB Run-Time Engine, that is zipped (unzipped it is 112 MB).  So your installer is somewhere in between the "bare" RTE and the "Full" that is because in the Installer Builder you get to choose whether or not DataSocket Support is included or USI or shared Variable Support, etc.  So you can build something in between.  If you don't use the Installer Builder the only way to make sure the other machine has what you need (minus drivers) is to download the "Full" RTE install it and then copy over your application, which would mean a larger overall download and a larger install base.  So while things have gotten bigger we did do some work from them getting even worse.

Creating an installer with no executable in it and just the RTE checked I got a 65.9 MB installer. 22.0MB of that is the "bare" RTE and one of its main dependencies, 6.3MB of it is Analysis VI support (we assumed most people are doing some sort of analysis and would want this), 13.1 MB is for NI Logos a communication protocol used by DataSocket, the Shared Variable and our security settings (Honestly I was surprised it was there, I'm going to see why and if we can stop automatically including it).  So what is the other 24.5 MB?  Well without going into to details it is mechanisms that allow the installers we are building to run and be uninstalled, etc.

Kennon

[Marc_A]

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@becktho wrote:

After reading Shane's post - what happens if I reinstall the same program? Is the already existing application detected? How is this case handled?

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I found out that it does detect the previous install and simply copies the new application on top of the old without reinstalling all of the dependencies.  The 400 meg installer I mentioned earlier in this thread detected all of the parts on a reinstall and it only took a second to copy over the exe and subVIs.

[Kennon_Cotton]

Shane,

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@shoeill wrote:
Does this mean that if I develop an application with Motion, Vision and VISA (Including named axes, named ports and so on) that EVERYTHING will be included in the installer?

No more defining virtual COM-port names when installing?

No more exporting and importing PID settings for motion controllers?

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That is the goal, you can now include all the drivers you need, as far as the hardware configuration you can include that as well via the Hardware Configuration options on the Advanced Page.  There is a button that will launch the MAX export wizard where you can choose configuration information to include in your installer.  What configuration information is there actually depends on what the driver (NI-Motion, NI-Vision, etc) has implemented for import and export.  The ability to include your hardware configuration has been around since LabVIEW 6.1, but not all of our drivers were taking advantage of it and without including the drivers themselves it wasn't as useful.

I'm not sure if you can include all of this information or not, I don't have all those drivers on my system.  But you can test it by going into MAX and choosing File>Export, this will open the same wizard the Installer Builder uses.  Like I said it is dependent on the features of the driver so a newer version may have more features than an older one.

When you include hardware configuration through the Installer Builder, there is a .nce file that is included in the installer and installed on the system.  The installer will prompt for a reboot at the end, then after rebooting the MAX import wizard will run and silently import the configuration information.

Kennon

[Kennon_Cotton]

One more post for today about upgrading / what if a version is already installed on the system for Shane, tst & Thomas.

For your files that you are including in the installer on the Source Files page, I'll call it the "developer part", if it is already installed on the system, and the product version that is on the system is the same or lower than the developer part being installed, the old developer part will be uninstalled and the new one will be installed.  If the product version on the system is higher than the one being installed, it will be skipped and the rest of the included installers will be checked.  The way the installers tell if a developer part is included on the system is a GUID called the upgrade code which isn't visible in the properties dialog but can be seen in the XML that makes up the .lvproj file.  Each installer specification has its own upgrade code.  As Marc A said if you have only updated the files in your developer part, rebuilt your installer and run it on a system that you ran a previous build on, the installer will run quickly.  In fact, there is a summary dialog in the installer (last screen with a next button before the real work starts) that shows you what will be added or changed and what will be removed.

The additional installers you include that only allow one version to be installed at a time (like FieldPoint) go through a similar sort of check and if the version is the same or lower the old version is removed and the new version is installed.  Some of the additional installers do allow for 'side-by-side' installs (like the LabVIEW Run-Time Engine), those will do checks as well but instead of removing the old version, the new version will just install if it isn't already installed.  You'll basically get the same behavior as if you had run the individual installers.  So you can check your NI Software in Add/Remove Programs to see which installers appear to be side-by-side and which don't (most drivers don't).

tst - I was going to say that your 6.1 exe would stop working but I'm not 100% sure.  I believe the behavior I've heard reported about FieldPoint 5.0 is when it installs and removes FieldPoint 4.1, and that the FieldPoint VIs in vi.lib for LabVIEW 6.1 will be removed.  Since your LabVIEW 6.1 exe would have already been compiled with those VIs and they would be inside the .exe, they won't go away, and FieldPoint's DLLs will still be installed it will be a question of whether or not the 6.1 exe with the 4.1 VIs can work with the 5.0 DLLs, which that interface shouldn't change much so it would probably work.  However installing FieldPoint 5.0 via the installer builder will cause the VIs to be removed from LabVIEW 6.1, just as if you had ran the FieldPoint 5.0 installer by itself.

Kennon

[tst]

OK, thanks. I don't think we actually have any more FP systems on 6.1, as I believe they've all been either upgraded to 7.0 at one point or another or started in 7, so I don't think we will have a problem with that.