deploying without including the RTE

[menchar]

Is it possible to deploy a CVI application using the distribution kit mechanism (MSI API) without including the RTE?

I'd like to pre-deploy a full up RTE to a set of 12 target systems, then distribute just the application without the RTE from then on.

How can I create a full-up RTE distribution, that I can be certain contains all the DLL's I might ever need with a CVI application?

If I need to remove an RTE, how can I be certain I got everything?  If I try to remove the RTE using add / remove programs, I belive the RTE DLL's are left in the system folder, even though the RTE disappears from the "remove programs" list.

Thanks.

Menchar

[Mert_A.]

NI has various versions of the CVI RTE available for download from ni.com. This is the best way to install a complete RTE.  If you remove the RTE from Add/Remove programs, generally it should uninstall all the DLLs it owns. The exception is a system which has had a 7.1 (or earlier) CVI RTE installed on it. These older installers intentionally over-incremented the RTE DLLs' reference counts so that they would not be removed when the uninstaller ran. The DLL abandoning is permanent, even if the RTE installation was later upgraded to version 8.0 or higher.

As far as excluding the RTE from your distribution kit, you can just uncheck that item on the Drivers & Components tab.

Mert A.
National Instruments

[menchar]

Thanks for the response.  This may explain why I was still seeing NI dll's after "removing" the RTE.

There's only one choice for "the" 8.5 RTE on the NI download page. 

Is this a full-up RTE that will work with anything I can possibly build using the 8.5 FDS?  At 48MB (!) it seems big enough.

How can I be certain I've removed any and all lingering pre-8.0 RTE DLL's?  How do I distinguish a RTE DLL  from, say, a NI vision DLL?

Menchar

[Mert_A.]

You know, I was a little surprised to see all those links to old versions of the RTE... I guess they're only on that page when viewed internally from NI. Yes, the linked installer is as "full" an installer as you will find for the CVI RTE. Of course, if you use APIs in your CVI programs that lie outside the RTE, you'll need additional runtime support for those. You can use the distribution builder's Drivers & Components tab to get a feel for what is and isn't considered part of the CVI RTE. Anything in the list that is not a child of the "LabWindows/CVI Run-Time Engine" item will require additional runtime support.

We don't provide a manifest or other comprehensive list of files that are comprised by the CVI RTE. The actual set is fairly fluid across releases and there is a lot of DLL sharing between NI products. That's one reason not to go around manually deleting RTE DLLs. You should rely on the installer technology's (MSI) built-in reference counting mechanism to take care of file removal for uninstalls. Of course, as I previously stated, older CVI RTE installs prevented the files from being removed, but the leftover files shouldn't cause problems. Upgrades still replace old files with new ones.

Mert A.
National Instruments