UNC Destination Paths

[markar...@gmail.com]

Does MSI support UNC for destination paths?

I've tried both WiX and WISE to author an MSI that copies files to a
share published via DFS.

For example (WiX),

<Directory Id='mydir' LongName='\\foo.bar.baz\cifs\mydir\' >

Where \\foo.bar.baz\cifs\ is the DFS root and \\foo.bar.baz\cifs\mydir\
is the DFS link.

Candle.exe (WiX) complains about the backslashes.

Is there a workaround for this? I need to deploy my MSI over UNC, as we
do not use mapped drives on our servers.

Thanks,
Mark

[dba...@cyberone.com.au]

Hi,

I use MAKEMSI and an not familiar with WIX but since no one else has
answered....

You could set LongName to some dummy value (TARGETDIR if possible) and
then update "Id" with a CA (Custom Action Type 35).

Bye,
Dennis Bareis

[Richard [Microsoft Windows Installer MVP]]

[Please do not mail me a copy of your followup]

markar...@gmail.com spake the secret code
<1126028492.1...@o13g2000cwo.googlegroups.com> thusly:

>For example (WiX),
>
><Directory Id='mydir' LongName='\\foo.bar.baz\cifs\mydir\' >
>
>Where \\foo.bar.baz\cifs\ is the DFS root and \\foo.bar.baz\cifs\mydir\
>is the DFS link.

I'm not familiar with WiX, but the Directory table doesn't record full
paths, it records path elements, one per row. So if this is meant to
be a representation of a single row in the Directory table, you can't
have that. Also, the directory table doesn't specify absolute paths
anyway, it only specifies a directory hierarchy relative to TARGETDIR
and SourceDir. It sounds to me like you want to invoke your MSI at
runtime with a UNC path setting for TARGETDIR. I haven't tried that
and I don't know if it would work or not, but simply try doing

msiexec /i <path to msi> TARGETDIR=<unc path>

Assuming that TARGETDIR is bound to your final application path; you
might need to use INSTALLDIR or some other property name as
appropriate.
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