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Distribution set?

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YC Lo

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Aug 9, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/9/97
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I need to have a distribution set which installs a VC++ app and a VFP5.0
app.
Is there any commercial product, which would install the VFP dlls (for
runtime) successfully? [other than using VFP Setup]
Thank you all.

Hood Gardner

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Aug 10, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/10/97
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You might want to look at Stirling's InstallShield,
http://www.installshield.com
They support all MS dev environments

Hood Gardner
Network Administrator/Webmaster
Osment Models, Inc.

Waleed Hasan

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Aug 11, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/11/97
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Hi Michael,

I faced the installation problm with VFP since I needed to install the main
application on a network HD but run it from all workstations,

I ended up using two projects!
One is the original project having everything in it and a second project
that has only the OCXs & DLLs and an icon showing a text file telling the
user how to change the shortcut to point to the main application on the
network.
I made 2 distribution sets, one for the server (from the 1st project) & one
for Workstation Installation (from the second project)
I put both sets on the distribution CD and have the user setup each
workstation.

Hope this help.
Cheers,
Waleed,


Michael Piehl

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Aug 11, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/11/97
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>You might want to look at Stirling's InstallShield,
>http://www.installshield.com
>They support all MS dev environments
>
> Hood Gardner
> Network Administrator/Webmaster
> Osment Models, Inc.

Hood,

I wouldn't go so far to say that they support all MS dev environments.
I would love to distribute my VFP app using InstallShield. I called
them and asked if they support VFP. They said it should work but they
couldn't say for sure. So I asked them - if I bought the product and
had trouble getting it to work with VFP, would they support it and
they said no - nobody there knows how to use it with VFP.

Now I'm not saying it won't work, but I'm not going to drop $700 of my
money for no support and a bit headache. I've seen several requests on
this newsgroup for help on using InstallShield with VFP, but no
replies.

Mike Piehl
Locutus Software Inc.

Michael Piehl

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Aug 12, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/12/97
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Waleed,

What did you build 2 projects with? InstallShield or VFP Setup Wizard?
I would like to find someone who used InstallShield with VFP.

Carlos Berguido

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Aug 12, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/12/97
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I have started to evaluate Eschalon Setup and so far am very impressed with
it's flexibility and it's ability to keep the interface as simple or as complex
as you want. There is a trial version available for download at:
www.eschalon.com

One neat feature is that it will monitor your running application and create a
list of all support dll's and their locations that are used by your application
and include them in the setup. These files would not include the ODBC
administrator accessed by a user through the control panel, so I would not
recommend going that route however, even if your code sets up new ODBC
connections programmatically.

To be safe, and because no one seems to have a list of all the files needed for
VFP runtime and ODBC :(, I plan to comb through my list of files included by
VFP's setup wizard with and without VFP runtime and ODBC to deduce which files
are actually needed and which files are just used by VFP Setup to do an
installation on the user's system.

Cheers,

- Carlos

YC Lo <yc...@rocketmail.com> wrote in article <33EBE3...@rocketmail.com>...

Waleed Hasan

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Aug 12, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/12/97
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Hi Michael,

> Waleed,
>
> What did you build 2 projects with? InstallShield or VFP Setup Wizard?

It was VFP Setup Wizard!

> I would like to find someone who used InstallShield with VFP.

As far as I know, you can't use InstallShield with VFP. I didn't try it but
a friend of mine tried but in vain! .. I think we need to stick to the Foxy
Installation :-)

Brett Barton

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Aug 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/14/97
to Carlos Berguido

I don't believe the problem is as simple as which files are needed by a
distributed VFP .exe. To distribute an .exe (without using the setup
wizard) in the old FP 2.6 days, we simply created a sub-dir on our
cutomer's network, put the .exe, config.fpw, etc. in there along with
the 2 FP runtime files (FOX2600.ESL and FOX2600.ESO). You could run the
.exe from any WFW workstation without doing a setup or install prog.
Then came VFP 3.0. There was no way to get around a workstation setup
for WFW 3.11 - VFP 3.0 required all kinds of WIN32s .dll's to be
installed in the system sub-dir. Now VFP 5.0. According to the doc the
.exe only needs the VFP500.DLL and the VFP5ENU.DLL. We formatted a PC
and put a fresh install of WIN95 on it. I created a test sub-dir with a
VFP50 test.exe app, put the 2 runtime dll's in the system32 sub-dir and
the .exe would not run (It comes up with a VFP500.dll is missing or
damaged dialog). The problem goes away after installing the app with
VFP50's setup wizard program (which creates about 3 Megs of junk for a 1
form, no data exe!). We theorize that the VFP50 setup program is putting
some entrys in the registry that the VFP500.dll needs to load. Can
anyone verify this and if so is there a workaround ? The VFP50 setup
wizard created a 7+ Meg setup file for one of our real app's and this is
really not usable for us.

Thanks,
Brett :)

Waleed Hasan

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Aug 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/14/97
to

Hi Brett Barton

Please read my Re to Michael above, I've solve the problem of WS setup
using the setup wizard & it's working just fine.

Waleed Hassan

YC Lo

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Aug 15, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/15/97
to

Is the error message with you get : "VFP500.dll is invalid or damaged"
? If so, check out
http://www.microsoft.com/kb/articles/q158/0/64.htm. It has to do with
an out-of-date
OLEAUT32.dll file.

Does anyoune know whether including this file into a distribution set,
using other installsoftware like InstallShield Express (not VFP Setup)
would work?
Thanks.

Theo McCormick

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Aug 22, 1997, 3:00:00 AM8/22/97
to

YC Lo wrote:
>
> Is the error message with you get : "VFP500.dll is invalid or damaged"
> ? If so, check out
> http://www.microsoft.com/kb/articles/q158/0/64.htm. It has to do with
> an out-of-date
> OLEAUT32.dll file.
>
> Does anyoune know whether including this file into a distribution set,
> using other installsoftware like InstallShield Express (not VFP Setup)
> would work?
> Thanks.

I'm working with Install shield 5.0 and see no reason why it should not
work. I have built a .exe install file for my workstations and it works
fine. I don't do any registration at all. I know I would have to place
registry entries if my app was to be a OLE sever or such but it does run
my app just fine. I included OLEAUT32.dll. The install wizard looks
funky to me and it doesn't have the hooks I need. I could also use a
list of what the install wizard registers!

I will let the list know how Install shield 5.0 pans out for VFP!

Theo

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