MSI

Google Adwords Editor 9.7.1 again has been released with major design flaws, see Developers best practice for Windows user profiles. It saves itself, including Adwords data in Windows folder structures that are getting lost on a user logout. Additional to this, there is no way to redirect the data folder to a Roaming Profile folder like it's possible with Google Chrome.

The fundamental broken Windows basics are:

• Roaming Profiles are not supported
  • As result - all data and the application itself get's lost if you log off from the computer.
  • This happens for the reason that the Application is installed to LocalAppDataFolder, what is a folder that is per definition a folder that is excluded from roaming.
• Application is not installed for All Users
  • This is at least wrong design as Adwords should be used by 98% in Enterprises and not at home. The application need to be deployable per machine to be Enterprise ready.

How to workaround some of the issues?

If you'd like to deploy VMware Player in your Enterprise you need to extract the MSI setup from the standard setup. You need to download the normal VMware-player-4.0.1-528992.exe file from VMware site. Than just launch these installer .exe, wait until the setup shows the "Welcome to the installation wizard for VMware Player", but don't install the Player. While the setup is launched setup creates a folder in C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Local\Temp\vmware_[random number]. Make a copy of this folder to your distribution share. Cancel the launched setup. Now you have the required MSI file vmware player.msi in the copied folder.

If you try to deploy VMware Player 4.0.0-471780 or 4.0.1-528992 to your Desktops via Active Directory you will expierence some major difficulties. At very first it's not possible to install at all. After some investigation it looks like very many others reported this bug in the VMware Community Forums, but nobody came up with a solution.

This is a note for all others searching for a XMind - Mind Mapping version that can be deployed in Enterprise via Active Directory. I'm not a developer of XMind, but I've created a full-fledged per Machine MSI setup for the XMind Team to make XMind deployable via Active Directory. If you'd like to push it out to your users desktops - it's available now. No need to wrap suxxx NSIS installer into an MSI any longer.

It has been deployed to ~50 machines without any issues. I have not received any feedback from the XMind guys yet, but hope it will see the public light soon. If you need it before it get's officially published - drop me an email, please.

These are the setup features that have been implemented and can be enabled/disabled via transforms:

This is a note for all others searching for a Notepad++ version that can be deployed in Enterprise via Active Directory. I'm not a developer of Notepad++, but I've created a full-fledged per Machine MSI setup for the Notepad++ Team to make Notepad++ deployable via Active Directory. If you'd like to push it out to your users desktops - it's available now. No need to wrap suxxx NSIS installer into an MSI any longer.

It's currently under final testing, but has been deployed and upgraded since version 5.9.3 to ~50 machines without any issues. I'm currently in contact with the main developer about a few features and hope we can get this MSI version public soon. If you need it before it get's officially published - drop me an email, please.

This is a note for all others searching for a PDFsam version that can be deployed in Enterprise via Active Directory. I'm not a member of the PDFsam team, but I've created a full-fledged per Machine MSI setup for them to make PDFsam deployable via Active Directory. If you'd like to push it out to your users desktops - it's available now. No need to wrap suxxx NSIS installer into an MSI any longer.

I have received feedback from the main developer that we will look into it for the next official version. I hope it can be published on the PDFsam project homepage soon. If you need it before it get's officially published - drop me an email, please.

These are the setup features that have been implemented and can be enabled/disabled via transforms:

This is a note for all others searching for a FastStone Capture version that can be deployed in Enterprise via Active Directory. I'm not an employee of FastStone Soft, but I've created a full-fledged per Machine MSI setup for them to make FastStone Capture deployable via Active Directory. If you'd like to push it out to your users desktops - it's available now. No need to wrap suxxx NSIS installer into an MSI any longer.

It was me a pleasure to help these guys and they are currently doing their in-house testing, but as these guys have been proven to be are really open minded and thankful - I'm sure they are able to provide you the new MSI setup before it get's published on their site in future. I cannot publish the setup here as this is not Open Source.