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Upgrading Projects from InstallShield 2011 Express Edition or Earlier

InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition

The following information describes possible upgrade issues that may occur when you upgrade projects that were created with InstallShield 2011 Express Edition and earlier to InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition. It also alerts you to possible changes in behavior that you may notice between new InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition projects and projects that are upgraded from InstallShield 2011 Express Edition or earlier to InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition.

General Information about Upgrading Projects that Were Created in Earlier Versions of InstallShield

If you use InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition to open a project that was created with an earlier version, InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition displays a message box that asks you if you want to convert the project to the new version. If you reply that you do want to convert it, InstallShield creates a backup copy of the project with a file extension such as .771 before converting it. Delete the .771 part from the original project's file name if you want to reopen the project in the earlier version of InstallShield. Note that you cannot open InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition projects in earlier versions of InstallShield.

You can upgrade projects that were created with the following versions of InstallShield Express Edition to InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition: InstallShield 2011 Express Edition and earlier, InstallShield 12 Express Edition and earlier and InstallShield Express 5 and earlier. Note that projects that were created with InstallShield MultiPlatform or InstallShield Universal cannot be upgraded to InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition.

Changes that Affect All Projects (New and Upgraded Projects)

This section describes changes that affect both new projects and projects that are upgraded from earlier versions of InstallShield.

Build Warning -7235 for Express Projects

By default, software identification tagging is enabled in all Express projects. This applies to new projects that you create in InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition, as well as projects that you have upgraded from earlier versions of InstallShield to InstallShield 2012 Spring Express Edition.

If you build a release in an Express project without entering data in the required identification tag settings (the Unique ID, Tag Creator, and Tag Creator ID settings in the General Information view), and you leave tagging enabled in the project, build warning -7235 occurs. This build warning explains that the software identification tag could not be created and included in the installation because a specific required setting was left blank. To resolve this warning, enter appropriate value in each specific setting, or select No for the Use Software Identification Tag setting in the General Information view.

COM Extraction Changes

InstallShield supports a new monitoring method for COM extraction. If you are using InstallShield on a Windows Vista or later system or a Windows Server 2008 or later system, this new method is used by default. The method uses a kernel driver to monitor the areas of the registry that are modified during dynamic COM extraction at build time and static COM extraction at design time. It combines the advantages that the earlier methods provided, allowing the DLL to read existing registries entries and preventing changes to the build machine.

If necessary, you can switch between the three different COM extraction methods by setting the value data of the UseAPIRegistryHooks registry value, which is in the registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\InstallShield\RegSpy (on 32-bit machines) or HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\InstallShield\RegSpy (on 64-bit machines). Possible REG_DWORD value data are:

This functionality applies to Express projects.

See Also

What's New in InstallShield 2012 Express Edition

Upgrading from Earlier Versions of InstallShield