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innounp, the Inno Setup Unpacker
 Version 0.49
 Supports Inno Setup versions 2.0.7 through 6.0.2
Inno Setup is a popular program for making software installations. Unfortunately, there is no official unpacker - the only method of getting the files out of the self-extracting executable is to run it. One piece of software that addresses this issue is Sergei Wanin's InstallExplorer, a plug-in for the FAR Manager that unpacks several types of installations, including Inno Setup (IS). But since it is not updated in a timely fashion, and so does not support the latest IS most of the time, this program was born. The advantages over InstallExplorer are:
Innounp is open source and based on IS source. Therefore, it is more likely to support future IS versions.
It recovers portions of the installation script (.iss file), including the registry changes and the compiled Innerfuse/RemObjects Pascal Script, if available.
Installshield decompiling is developing into a full-fledged science, after NaTzGUL's 'bahnbrechenden'. In a sofware world where more and more processes are hidden or concealed from the users, the fact that (some) users are re-gaining control is a very positive development. A Decompiler will follow anyway. Its only a question of time when it will be written so watch out for it,hehe.  F) ADD-0ON This part will describe the most common InstallSHIELD Installation. If Setup.exe (InstallSHIELD 2.x) is a 16 Bit executeable, then its called The Installation launcher.
If you want to report a bug, request a feature, or discuss anything else related to the program, please write to the forum.
On this page:Usage | How to report bugs | What's new/History | MultiArc settings | Copyrights and licensingIn other places:Download | Forum | Project summary page on SF.net | HomepageBoth the source and the executable packages are compressed with WinRar. While the full-featured packer is shareware, the UnRar utility that can only extract files is free. And there are lots of free third-party programs that unpack rar just fine, e.g. 7-Zip.
As a bonus, a simple unpacker for Setup Factory installations is available on the download page. It is ripped from the SynCE project.
UsageInnounp is a console application, and it uses command-line options to find out what to do. For a more human-friendly interface utilizing FAR or Total Commander as a front-end see the MultiArc section below. Windows Explorer fans: nullz has made some .reg scripts to add innounp into the right-click menu and Richard Santaella crafted a graphical wrapper for innounp (get it on the download page).
If an installation has setup.0 (it is made without using SetupLdr), run innounp on setup.0 instead of setup.exe.
To extract all files from a specific directory, use dirname*.*, not just dirname.
By default all files are extracted to the current directory. Use -d to override this behaviour. For example, -dUnpacked will create a directory named Unpacked inside the current directory and put the extracted files there.
The -c option is a little more tricky to explain. Suppose you opened an installation in a file manager and browsed to {app}subdirprogram.exe. Now if you copied program.exe to another location, the entire directory tree ({app}subdir) would be created and program.exe would be extracted there. -c notifies innounp that you are only interested in paths from the current directory and below, so that your file, program.exe, is extracted right where you intended to copy it, not several directory levels deeper. Note that in order to avoid confusion, files must still be specified by their full path names inside the installation.
Note that an installation can contain several identical files (possibly under different names). Inno Setup stores only one copy of such files, and by default innounp will also unpack one file. If you want to have all files that could ever be installed anywhere, regardless of how many identical files this may get you, -a option will do it.
If -m is specified, the file listing includes embeddedCompiledCode.bin which is the code made by the RemObjects Pascal Script compiler. It is possible to disassemble it using the ifps3_disasm.rar package on the download page. The result is not very readable though since it uses the basic 'disassembler' from IFPS3. Anyone wants to write a decompiler?
How to report bugsOK, I know innounp is far from being perfect, but it is my intention to make the program usable. User feedback is a great way to achieve this. Here's what you should do if you find a bug and want it fixed.
Tell me what's wrong with innounp. If you encountered incorrect behaviour, say what you think it should do and what it actually does. If it crashed or gave an error message, say what did that - innounp, Windows, FAR, etc, and include the details.
Describe the exact steps necessary to reproduce the bug. Say what are the preconditions. Is the bug specific to some system settings? To a setup file you have? (include the problem part of the installation script or a link to the compiled setup, if it is small enough) To an IS version? To something else? Or does the bug occur regardless of these things?
Once you have the bug report ready, post it to the forum. Remember, if I can't reproduce the bug using the description you gave, the chances that it will be fixed fall dramatically.
If the above guidelines were not obvious for you, I suggest that you read the following articles.
How to Ask Questions the Smart Way by Eric Raymond
How to Report Bugs Effectively by Simon Tatham
What's new / History0.49(2019.05.09)
Added support for IS 6.0.
0.48(2019.01.25)
Added support for IS 5.6.2.
Fixed regresson bug introduced by 5.6.0 support.
0.47(2018.07.02)
Added support for IS 5.6.0 and 5.6.1.
Added AppId field to the script.
0.46(2016.04.11)
Increased max. LZMA dictionary size to 1Gb (implemented in IS 5.5.9).
0.45(2015.12.31)
Added support for IS 5.5.7.
0.44(2015.11.24)
Fixed infinite loop issue on some unsupported versions.
Now -m flag does not affect reconstructed script content. It always contains all info.
Minor changes.
0.43(2015.07.18)
Added support for IS 5.5.6.
0.42(2015.05.27)
Added support for IS 1.3.21 and 1.3.25.
Experimental support for some custom IS versions.
Fixed encoding of several entries in reconstructed script.
0.41(2015.03.18)
All slashes in file paths are converted to Windows style for consistency.
Improved some error messages.
Fixed several parameter names in [INI] section of the script.
0.40(2013.12.20)
Synchronized Description fields encoding in reconstructed script.
Minor changes.
0.39(2013.07.12)
Fixed CRC32 calculation during unpacking (regression bug).
0.38(2013.02.01)
Added InstallDelete and UninstallDelete sections to reconstructed script.
Added some more values to Setup section of reconstructed script.
Several minor reconstructed script improvements.
0.37(2012.06.02)
Added support for IS 5.5.0.
Fixed problem with reading of large files.
Added some more values to reconstructed script.
Improved FAR MultiArc settings.
0.36(2011.06.01)
Fixed support for IS 5.4.2.
Fixed issue with '{' symbol in file names.
0.35(2010.10.01)
Added support for IS 5.2.5 (wasn't released, but such installers can be found).
Added command to test files for integrity.
0.34(2010.09.16)
Less technical text in some error messages.
Added dump of password hash to reconstructed script.
Added some more values to reconstructed script.
0.33(2010.07.05)
Fixed encoding for custom messages in reconstructed script.
Fixed several parameters in [LangOptions] section.
Fixed language names in *.isl files for Unicode-based installers.
Added support for legacy IS versions 2.0.8 - 2.0.10.
0.32(2010.06.14)
Added support for IS versions 5.3.10 (both ANSI and Unicode).
Added support for INI section in reconstructed script.
0.31(2010.04.19)
Fixed issue with endless decompression loop on incompatible files.
0.30(2010.04.12)
Fixed issue with password processing for Unicode versions.
Added support for IS versions 5.3.9 (both ANSI and Unicode).
Added support for LZMA2 compression, introduced in 5.3.9.
0.29(2010.02.19)
Added support for IS versions 5.3.8 (both ANSI and Unicode).
0.28(2010.01.14)
Added support for IS versions 5.3.7 (both ANSI and Unicode).
Added support for legacy IS versions 2.0.11 - 2.0.17.
Fixed renaming of duplicate files. If we do not use -a then don't append numbers to names
 (this switch does not affect different files with same name, only duplicates with same content).
0.27(2009.12.04)
Yet another tuning for file mask processing.
Added overwrite prompt for files extraction (and option for auto-overwrite).
Several tweaks to reconstructed script.
0.26(2009.11.30)
Decompiler Installshield Installation ToolAdded manifest resource to resolve Vista/Win7 UAC issue.
Added restored %n formatter to custom messages.
Added default OutputBaseFilename value if one from header is empty.
0.25(2009.11.26)
Added support fro [Dirs] section in reconstructed script.
Moved version parameter in script to comment (since it is not original IS parameter).
Fixed ArchitecturesInstallIn64BitMode and ArchitecturesAllowed flags in script.
Fixed file mask processing in some cases.
0.24(2009.11.20)
Added support for IS versions 5.3.6 (both ANSI and Unicode).
Added version information resource.
Fixed extraction of multiple files with same name.
0.23(2009.09.25)
Added support for IS versions 5.3.5 (both ANSI and Unicode).
Added Inno Setup version info to reconstructed install script.
0.22(2009.08.24)
Added support for Unicode versions.
Added support for IS versions 5.3.0 - 5.3.4 (both ANSI and Unicode).
Fixed rare issue with double backslashes in file path.
0.21(2009.04.24)
Supports legacy IS versions 2.0.18 - 2.0.19
0.20(2008.05.23)
Supports IS up to version 5.2.3
Several bugs fixed.
0.19(2007.02.23)
Supports IS up to version 5.1.10
Fixed wrong representation of Unicode characters in LanguageName.
Another fix to the handling of duplicate file names.
New option -a to extract all copies of duplicate files.
0.18(2006.11.23)
The reconstructed script now includes the [Types], [CustomMessages], and [Languages] sections.
ROPS disassembler updated to support the latest build of ROPS.
New option -f to read the password from file. This way it can include any special characters.
 Be sure to save the file in the correct character encoding as no translations are applied.
Fixed the bug that caused the file timestamps to be inconsistently reported and applied (UTC vs. local).
Updated the decompression libraries: zlib to version 1.2.3, bzip2 to version 1.03, and LZMA to version 4.43 (optimized for speed).
0.17(2005.08.31)
Supports IS up to version 5.1.5.
Supports Martijn Laan's My Inno Setup Extensions 3.0.6.1 (by request).
The Types parameter is now space-separated, as required by the IS script specification.
0.16(2005.04.30)
Supports IS up to 5.1.2-beta.
Innounp will try to unpack new versions of IS to handle the cases when the binary format is compatible with one of the previous versions. Use -n to disable this attempt.
0.15(2005.03.08)
Supports IS up to 5.1.0-beta.
The old bug that prevented innounp from working properly with {reg:...} constants and the like has got another fix.
Preliminary support for the 64-bit extensions that appeared in IS 5.1.0.
0.14(2004.10.14)
Supports IS up to 5.0.4-beta.
It is now possible to specify the destination directory to extract files into using the -d option. This directory will be created if necessary.
New option -c specifies the current directory inside an installation and prevents the creation of the upper-level directories. MultiArc settings are updated accordingly.
The old -c command is removed. To get the compiled Pascal script, use -m and extract it like a normal file.
0.13(2004.08.26)
Supports IS up to 5.0.3-beta.
Supports the Components and Tasks sections.
0.12(2004.07.28)

Supports IS up to 5.0.0-beta.
Improved processing of big installations with many files.
Innounp now supports a certain level of user interaction - it prompts the user for password and disk changes as necessary. To switch this functionality off (e.g. in batch mode), use the -b option.
If no command is specified, innounp displays a brief summary of the specified installation. The old -i command is removed. To get the setup script, extract it like a normal file.
0.11(2004.05.04)
Supports IS 4.2.2.
Supports ArcFour encryption. Use the -p switch to specify a password if files are encrypted
0.10(2004.04.26)
Fixed (again): filenames containing invalid characters could not be specified on the command line or in a list file.
0.09(2004.04.22)
Fixed (again): invalid characters in filenames (such as ':' and '|') made innounp crash.
Updated TC MultiArc settings.
0.08(2004.04.14)
Added support for IS versions up to 4.2.1.
Added MultiArc settings for Total Commander (thanks to Gnozal).
Fixed a bug in MultiArc settings that prevented shells from displaying file dates and times (thanks to Maxim Ryazanov).
The reconstructed setup script (.iss) is now included together with the 'normal' files. Using -m option it's possible to view/extract other internal files in the same way.
0.07(2004.03.16)
Multiple files with the same name are not overwritten now, instead they are appended with numbers.
-c command extracts the compiled Innerfuse Pascal Script code to a file. It can then be 'disassembled' with a separate tool. Get one on the download page.
The output of -i command now looks more like .iss script. More data is included.
0.06(2004.03.11)
Added support for IS versions 3.0.0 - 4.0.0.
Supports installations that were not packaged into a single exe using SetupLdr (these can be identified by the presence of setup.0 which is appended to setup.exe in packaged installations).
-i command displays registry changes made by an installation.
Supports (displays and reads from filelists) filenames with national characters (single-byte character encodings only, Unicode/MBCS was not tested). The correct code page must be set in Windows for this function to work properly.
[fix] File dates and times were not set during extraction.
0.05(2004.03.09)
Improved batch processing. Now it's possible to browse and extract IS installations in FAR using the supplied settings for the standard MultiArc plug-in.
Removed isbunzip.dll. Bzip2 library is linked statically.
0.04(2004.02.27)
Initial release. Supports IS versions 4.0.1 - 4.1.8.

MultiArc settingsUnless you are a die-hard fan of command line, you may like the idea of working with IS installations like with conventional archives in a file manager. Right now two programs support this: FAR and Total Commander. Below are the instructions how to integrate innounp into each.
FARCopy innounp.exe to a directory in your PATH and edit your FARPluginsMultiArcFormatsCustom.ini file. There are two alternate settings differing in several aspects and each having its own pros and cons. Try the recommended setting first, if it does not work well for you, try the other setting or even combine them.
Co-operation with InstallExplorerIf you have InstallExplorer installed (or another plug-in that handles IS, but you will need to adjust the settings accordingly), you might want to let it process all the other types of installations but keep IS installations for innounp. FAR does not provide a means of customizing the plug-in call order; however, an empirical study has shown that it loads plug-ins and applies them to files in lexical order. So the solution is to rename InstallExplorer's dll file from 6InstExpl.dll to e.g. zInstExpl.dll (and restart FAR).
FAR: recommended settingFAR: alternate setting Will not work for IS 5.1.5 and up because new versions no longer have this signature. Total CommanderWill not work for IS 5.1.5 and up because new versions no longer have this signature. I guess the version-specific settings from above have to be cloned.
Configuration made up by Gnozal and Maxwish and posted on TC forum. Change the path below to where you have innounp installed and add this to your MultiArc.ini. Note that MultiArc is not included in the default TC installation, instead it is available as a separate download from Siarzhuk Zharski's web site. Refer to the help file for information on any additional configuration necessary.
Copyrights and licensingCopyright © 2004-2019 QuickeneR, 2009-2019 Ariman
 This program is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL). A copy of the license is included with the source files.
 If you distribute innounp on the WWW, please put a link to its home page, http://innounp.sourceforge.net
Over 90% of code is ripped from Inno Setup which is Copyright © 1997-2010 Jordan Russell. All rights reserved.
 Portions Copyright © 2000-2006 Martijn Laan. All rights reserved.
 See http://www.jrsoftware.org for details.
Contains zlib code, Copyright © 1995-2005 Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler.
Contains bzip2 code, Copyright © 1996-2009 Julian R Seward. All rights reserved.
Contains LZMA code, Copyright © 1999-2009 Igor Pavlov.
Innerfuse Pascal Script is Copyright © 2000-2004 by Carlo Kok, Innerfuse.
StripReloc is Copyright © 1999-2005 Jordan Russell, www.jrsoftware.org
General informationThere are several systems which vendors use to create installers for their applications. To make an educated guess about how to run an installer unattended, you need to know which system was used to create it. Sometimes this will be obvious from the installer's splash screen; sometimes you can figure it out by running strings; and sometimes you will have to guess.Of course, you can try running the installer with the /? Switch to find out which other switches it supports. But if you really expect this to work, then you have not been using Windows for very long.

Supports IS up to 5.0.0-beta.
Improved processing of big installations with many files.
Innounp now supports a certain level of user interaction - it prompts the user for password and disk changes as necessary. To switch this functionality off (e.g. in batch mode), use the -b option.
If no command is specified, innounp displays a brief summary of the specified installation. The old -i command is removed. To get the setup script, extract it like a normal file.
0.11(2004.05.04)
Supports IS 4.2.2.
Supports ArcFour encryption. Use the -p switch to specify a password if files are encrypted
0.10(2004.04.26)
Fixed (again): filenames containing invalid characters could not be specified on the command line or in a list file.
0.09(2004.04.22)
Fixed (again): invalid characters in filenames (such as ':' and '|') made innounp crash.
Updated TC MultiArc settings.
0.08(2004.04.14)
Added support for IS versions up to 4.2.1.
Added MultiArc settings for Total Commander (thanks to Gnozal).
Fixed a bug in MultiArc settings that prevented shells from displaying file dates and times (thanks to Maxim Ryazanov).
The reconstructed setup script (.iss) is now included together with the 'normal' files. Using -m option it's possible to view/extract other internal files in the same way.
0.07(2004.03.16)
Multiple files with the same name are not overwritten now, instead they are appended with numbers.
-c command extracts the compiled Innerfuse Pascal Script code to a file. It can then be 'disassembled' with a separate tool. Get one on the download page.
The output of -i command now looks more like .iss script. More data is included.
0.06(2004.03.11)
Added support for IS versions 3.0.0 - 4.0.0.
Supports installations that were not packaged into a single exe using SetupLdr (these can be identified by the presence of setup.0 which is appended to setup.exe in packaged installations).
-i command displays registry changes made by an installation.
Supports (displays and reads from filelists) filenames with national characters (single-byte character encodings only, Unicode/MBCS was not tested). The correct code page must be set in Windows for this function to work properly.
[fix] File dates and times were not set during extraction.
0.05(2004.03.09)
Improved batch processing. Now it's possible to browse and extract IS installations in FAR using the supplied settings for the standard MultiArc plug-in.
Removed isbunzip.dll. Bzip2 library is linked statically.
0.04(2004.02.27)
Initial release. Supports IS versions 4.0.1 - 4.1.8.
MultiArc settingsUnless you are a die-hard fan of command line, you may like the idea of working with IS installations like with conventional archives in a file manager. Right now two programs support this: FAR and Total Commander. Below are the instructions how to integrate innounp into each.
FARCopy innounp.exe to a directory in your PATH and edit your FARPluginsMultiArcFormatsCustom.ini file. There are two alternate settings differing in several aspects and each having its own pros and cons. Try the recommended setting first, if it does not work well for you, try the other setting or even combine them.
Co-operation with InstallExplorerIf you have InstallExplorer installed (or another plug-in that handles IS, but you will need to adjust the settings accordingly), you might want to let it process all the other types of installations but keep IS installations for innounp. FAR does not provide a means of customizing the plug-in call order; however, an empirical study has shown that it loads plug-ins and applies them to files in lexical order. So the solution is to rename InstallExplorer's dll file from 6InstExpl.dll to e.g. zInstExpl.dll (and restart FAR).
FAR: recommended settingFAR: alternate setting Will not work for IS 5.1.5 and up because new versions no longer have this signature. Total CommanderWill not work for IS 5.1.5 and up because new versions no longer have this signature. I guess the version-specific settings from above have to be cloned.
Configuration made up by Gnozal and Maxwish and posted on TC forum. Change the path below to where you have innounp installed and add this to your MultiArc.ini. Note that MultiArc is not included in the default TC installation, instead it is available as a separate download from Siarzhuk Zharski's web site. Refer to the help file for information on any additional configuration necessary.
Copyrights and licensingCopyright © 2004-2019 QuickeneR, 2009-2019 Ariman
 This program is licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL). A copy of the license is included with the source files.
 If you distribute innounp on the WWW, please put a link to its home page, http://innounp.sourceforge.net
Over 90% of code is ripped from Inno Setup which is Copyright © 1997-2010 Jordan Russell. All rights reserved.
 Portions Copyright © 2000-2006 Martijn Laan. All rights reserved.
 See http://www.jrsoftware.org for details.
Contains zlib code, Copyright © 1995-2005 Jean-loup Gailly and Mark Adler.
Contains bzip2 code, Copyright © 1996-2009 Julian R Seward. All rights reserved.
Contains LZMA code, Copyright © 1999-2009 Igor Pavlov.
Innerfuse Pascal Script is Copyright © 2000-2004 by Carlo Kok, Innerfuse.
StripReloc is Copyright © 1999-2005 Jordan Russell, www.jrsoftware.org
General informationThere are several systems which vendors use to create installers for their applications. To make an educated guess about how to run an installer unattended, you need to know which system was used to create it. Sometimes this will be obvious from the installer's splash screen; sometimes you can figure it out by running strings; and sometimes you will have to guess.Of course, you can try running the installer with the /? Switch to find out which other switches it supports. But if you really expect this to work, then you have not been using Windows for very long.
In my experience, the odds are about 1 in 4 that /? Will tell you anything at all, even when there is something to tell.MSI packagesMicrosoft's own Windows Installer Service is the nominal standard, and if everybody used it, there would be no need for this document. Unfortunately, Microsoft invented it too late.The package files have a.msi extension, and you manipulate them using the msiexec utility.For installation, use the /i and /qb switches. Use the /l. switch to produce a log file. You can provide named options (or 'properties') at the end of the command line; which properties are supported depends on the package. For example, this command:msiexec /qb /l.
perl-log.txt /i ActivePerl.msi PERLPATH=Yes PERLEXT=Yes.is how you install ActiveState Perl, instructing the MSI package to add Perl.exe to your PATH and to associate.pl files with it. (See below for more on Perl.)Perhaps the most important common property is the REBOOT property, which you can use to suppress any automatic reboot the MSI package might try to perform. So in general, you want to provide the /i, /qb, and REBOOT=ReallySuppress parameters to msiexec.msiexec can do many other things, like uninstall software or apply patches. Too bad nobody uses it.InstallShieldInstallShield is one of the oldest and most widely used application packaging systems.Installers created by InstallShield recognize the /r, /s, /sms, /f1, and /f2 switches. The installer itself is invariably named setup.exe.To perform a silent installation, you need an InstallShield 'answer file', customarily named setup.iss. Some applications ship with such a file, but if yours does not, you can use the graphical installer itself to create one.Here is how it works. Run the installer with the /r ('record') switch.
Proceed through the dialogs and complete the installation. This will create a setup.iss file and place it in the C:WINDOWS directory (yes, really). This file will include all of your responses to the InstallShield dialogs, allowing you to perform unattended installations as if you were giving the same answers again. Simply copy setup.iss to the same directory as the installer executable.Once you have a setup.iss file, run the installer with the /s ('silent') option. This will perform an unattended installation.Unfortunately, the installer will fork a separate process and exit, meaning it will return immediately even if you run it under start /wait. This makes it useless for scripting purposes. Luckily, there is another switch, /sms, which will cause the installer to pause until the installation completes.Hence, for an InstallShield application, you want to provide both the /s and the /sms switches.The /f1filename switch allows you to specify a fully-qualified alternate name for the setup.iss file.
Note that there must be no space between the /f1 switch and the file name. This switch works both with /r to create the file and with /s to read it.The /f2filename switch specifies a log file. Once again, there must be no space between the switch and the file name.WARNING: Be careful what characters you use in these file names, because InstallShield silently strips certain non-alphanumerics (like hyphens).Oh, one more thing.
The /r and /s switches only work if the release engineer is competent. Many packages have 'custom dialogs' which are not supported by setup.iss, which means the dialogs will always appear no matter what you do. For such packages, I suggest asking the vendor to fix their installer. If that does not work, I suggest doing what you can to deprive them of business.PackagefortheWebInstallShield has a relatively new add-on product called PackagefortheWeb, or PFTW for short. This is basically an InstallShield tree bundled up as a single-file executable.When you run this executable, it extracts a bunch of files to a temporary directory and launches the setup.exe within.The PFTW package recognizes the /s and /a.
The /s switch instructs the PFTW package to run silently, although this does not necessarily mean that the underlying setup.exe will run silently.The /a. ('add') switch allows you to add switches to the command line of the underlying setup.exe process. You may provide any of the normal InstallShield switches here, including /r, /s, and /sms.Thus, to automate the installation of a PFTW package named foo.exe, you would first perform one installation by hand to create the answer file:foo.exe /a /r /f1c:tempfoo.issThen, to install the package completely silently, you would run:start /wait foo.exe /s /a /s /sms /f1c:tempfoo.issThe first /s is only needed for a completely silent installation.
Decompiler Installshield Installation SoftwareDecompiler Installshield Switches For ComputerDecompile Installshield InstallerIf you leave it off, the PFTW package will show you a status bar as it extracts the InstallShield tree to the temporary directory.InstallShield with MSIRecent versions (7 and above) of InstallShield's tools are able to produce MSI files. Read InstallShield's documentation for full details.These MSI files may be shipped alone or with a setup.exe installer.
These installers in turn come in two flavors, called 'InstallScript MSI' and 'Basic MSI'. InstallScript MSI uses the traditional InstallShield switches. Basic MSI is another story.To perform an unattended installation using a Basic MSI installer, you provide the /s /v'.' Switches, where. Represents any additional switches you want to pass down to msiexec. These should include the /qb (or /qn) switch to make the installation non-interactive, so a minimal invocation would be:setup.exe /s /v'/qb'Just to make things interesting, any of these mechanisms might be combined with PFTW. For example, I eventually figured out that the IBM Update Connector requires these flags for unattended installation:updcon532.exe /s /a /s /v'/qb'The first /s tells the PFTW installer to extract silently.
The /a tells it to provide the remaining switches to the underlying setup.exe. The second /s tells setup.exe to run silently, while the /v'/qb' tells it to pass /qb to msiexec, which causes msiexec to run non-interactively but display a basic interface.Finally, InstallShield has a KnowledgeBase article which is less helpful than you might expect. Are we having fun yet?Wise InstallMasterInstallMaster from Wise Solutions is a competitor to InstallShield. You can usually identify the installers it produces by running 'strings' on the executable and grepping for 'Wise'.InstallMaster installers are supposed to recognize the /s switch to perform a silent installation. And in my experience, they generally do.
But there is no way to set options, and the exit status is meaningless.NOTE: This product has been rebranded the 'Wise Installation System'. Don't let them confuse you.Inno SetupInno Setup is an open source competitor in this space.
You can usually identify the installers it creates by running 'strings' on the executable and grepping for 'Inno'.The switches for Inno Setup are fully documented in the ISetup.hlp file in the Inno distribution. The GnuWin32 project has put a copy on the Web.In my experience, the /silent switch is usually sufficient for a basic unattended installation. But to be completely sure, I recommend /sp- /silent /norestart.Note that the /verysilent switch may reboot the machine without prompting, which is pretty much the worst of all possible worlds. So if you use /verysilent, be sure to use /norestart as well.Nullsoft Scriptable Install SystemThe Nullsoft Scriptable Install System (NSIS) is another open source installation system.
It was created by the WinAmp authors to distribute that application, but it is now a general-purpose system which anyone might use.When an NSIS installer runs, it creates a little window which says verifying installer: N%, where N counts from 0 to 100. So you can recognize these installers by this behavior.
(Actually the verification procedure is optional, but most installers have it enabled. As an alternative, you can run 'strings' and grep for 'NSIS'.)NSIS installers recognize /S for silent installation, /NCRC to suppress the CRC (verification) step, and /D=dir to specify the 'output directory', which is where the program will be installed. These options are case-sensitive, so be sure to type them in upper case.Incidentally, all /S does is change the installer script's SilentInstall attribute from 'normal' to 'silent'. What effect this has, exactly, depends on the person who wrote the script. If /S does not perform a silent install, consider submitting a bug report to the installer's creator.Microsoft hotfixes and older packagesMost Microsoft hotfixes respond to the /? Switch, but they do not always tell you everything.According to KB article 816915 and KB article 824687, Microsoft is moving towards standardized packaging and naming for hotfixes.
But they are not done yet.Modern hotfixes support /passive (formerly /u) for unattended installation, /norestart (formerly /z) to suppress the automatic reboot, and /n to skip backing up files needed for uninstalling the hotfix.Some hotfixes use an old Microsoft packaging technology called 'IExpress', whose switches are more-or-less documented in KB article 197147 and an old USENET post. These installers first extract some stuff to a temporary folder and then run a command from inside that folder. They support the /t:path switch to specify the temporary folder name and the /c:command switch to specify the command to run. Specifying just /c suppresses running the command at all, so you can use /c /t:path to extract the hotfix just to look at it.These packages support the /q switch for quiet operation, except sometimes you have to use /q:a instead. They also support the /r:n switch to suppress the reboot. Sometimes these do not work and you have to fiddle with the /c:command switch; see the second 'NOTE' in KB article 317244 for an example.Leave it to Microsoft to make systems administration an experimental science.If all else fails.If the application simply has no unattended installation procedure, you can create your own.
I prefer to avoid these approaches if at all possible, since they are relatively unreliable and difficult to maintain.RepackagingThere are several tools around which can take a snapshot of a machine's state before and after a manual installation, compute the differences between the states, and bundle them up as an 'installer'. The Wise product line provides good support for this, and Microsoft's free tool (recently updated) provides bad support for it.The problem with this approach is that it fundamentally cannot work reliably. An installer's behavior may depend on the exact initial state of the machine, such as the OS version or the presence/absence of other installed software.
So the repackaged installer will almost never do exactly the same thing that a fresh installation would, unless the target machine is completely identical to the original machine.In addition, for every new release of an application, you will need to repackage it again. And there are other disadvantages which even Microsoft recognizes.For these reasons, I think repackaging is a very bad idea and I advise against it.AutoItAutoIt is a free tool which can simulate key presses and mouse clicks, following a script customarily named with a.aut extension.
Microsoft Installshield DownloadMost installers have a sufficiently simple and consistent interface that a very short AutoIt script suffices to automate their installation.The AutoIt distribution includes very good documentation. You can copy the AutoIt.exe program wherever you like (say, Z:bin) and invoke it standalone.AutoIt scripts do have drawbacks.First, you must be careful when upgrading to new releases of an application, since the installer's UI may have changed.More worryingly, AutoIt scripts are theoretically unreliable because they do not let you determine when a sub-process has exited. You can tell when AutoIt itself exits, but that is not the same thing at all.
Jaime escalante program pioneer high school. For example, an installer's last window might disappear while the installer was still working. Your master script, waiting only for the AutoIt executable, would then proceed, starting another installation or rebooting the machine.AutoIt provides Run and RunWait primitives, but it does not provide a way to wait for the termination of an application which was invoked by Run.
If it did, this race condition could be avoided.In practice, it does not matter much, because most installers do finish their work before destroying their last window. Just make sure your.aut script uses WinWaitClose to wait for that last window to vanish.copied from Patrick J. LoPresti patl@users.sourceforge.net w/ permission.
MSI files are Windows installer files (for Microsoft Installer) that Windows users can run to install software on a PC.You may experience a couple of issues with these type of setup files: installations may not complete properly, you may not be able to install the program on a network, or you may run into dependency issues if the system is lacking other required installations.Sometimes, you may only need access to a single file contained in the msi installation package, at other times, you may have noticed that all the installer did was extract the files to the system. In the latter case, extraction of the msi file may have yielded the same result, but with additional benefits including a fully portable application that does not leave traces behind on the host system.And if you are running a non-Windows system, extraction may be the only option you got to access files included in the msi installer package. Extracting msi files extracting msi installer filesDepending on the operating system that you work on, you may have multiple options to extract msi files.
Decompiler Installshield Installation WindowsThe is for instance available for Windows, Linux and Mac systems. It can be used to extract msi files on the host system.All that you need to do for that is right-click on the msi file, and select Extract Here to unpack the msi file on your system.
Installshield Install LogYou can alternatively open the archive instead using the same application. This opens all files in the 7-Zip program manager from where individual files can be extracted or run right away.If you are using Microsoft Windows, you can use programs such as, or.Note: Some extractors may not be able to unpack all msi files on your system. It is therefore a good idea to keep multiple tools at hand if you run into situations where your favorite program cannot extract the msi. There may also be a difference in how files are extracted. 7-Zip for instance extracts all files to the root directory, while the built-in msiexec tool will preserve directories.To use msiexec, you need to perform the following operation:. Tap on the Windows-key and type cmd. Right-click on cmd.exe and select Run as administrator from the context menu.
Silent Install InstallshieldConfirm the user account control prompt if it appears. Use the command msiexec /a msifilepath/qb TARGETDIR=targetpathYou can look up the full list of command line switches. The /a command applies the administrative installation option, the /qb parameter displays a basic user interface.Advertisement.