Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI Property Reference

InstallShield 2018

Project • This information applies to the following project types:

Advanced UI
Suite/Advanced UI

Edition • The Advanced UI project type is available in the Professional edition of InstallShield. The Suite/Advanced UI project type is available in the Premier edition of InstallShield. For information about the differences between these two project types, see Advanced UI Projects vs. Suite/Advanced UI Projects.

A number of properties are set during Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI installations. You can set the values of some of the properties from within InstallShield, while others are initialized by the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI engine at run time.

Unlike Basic MSI projects, Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI projects do not distinguish between public properties and private properties. However, capitalization must be maintained; if you use mixed uppercase and lowercase for the name of the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI property, ensure that you use the same capitalization every time that you refer to that property in your project.

Note that if a property that you define in the Property Manager view is set to a value that references a second property, and if you want the second property to be resolved in the first property’s value, you may need to select the Formatted check box for the first property. To learn more, see Property Manager View.

The following categories of built-in Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI properties are available:

Special Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI Properties
Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI Folder Properties
System Folder Properties

Note • Do not confuse Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI properties with path variables, which are surrounded by angle brackets (<>). While they both may represent directories, Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI properties are evaluated at run time, but path variables are used to point to source files only during installation authoring and at build time.

Special Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI Properties

The following properties indicate various miscellaneous information for the Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI installation.

Special Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI Properties

Property

Description

IS_CLR_VERSION

This property identifies a semicolon-delimited list of .NET Framework versions that a Suite/Advanced UI action should attempt to load to run your managed code and PowerShell scripts. In most scenarios, this property is not set in the installation package. It is set at the command line. To specify that version 1.1 is required, use the following command-line parameter:

IS_CLR_VERSION=v1.1.4322

Note that the complete version number of the .NET Framework should be specified for the property value. If more than one version is acceptable, you can specify a semicolon-delimited list of versions. The first one that can be loaded is used. For the following example command-line parameter, the action attempts to load version 2.0. If that version is not present, the action attempts to load version 1.1. If version 1.1 is not present, the action fails.

IS_CLR_VERSION=v2.0.50727;v1.1.4322

To specify that the action should attempt to load whatever is the latest version of the .NET Framework that is installed if none of the specified versions are installed, add a semicolon to the end of the property value, as shown in the following example:

IS_CLR_VERSION=v2.0.50727;v1.1.4322;

The semicolon at the end of the property value also indicates that if none of the specified versions are present but a version of the .NET Framework is already loaded, the action uses the currently loaded version, even if it is not the latest version that is installed.

If issues with the action occur at run time because of .NET Framework version mismatches, you may want to instruct end users to set the IS_CLR_VERSION property at the command line when they run your installation.

ISFeatureInstall

This property stores a comma-delimited list of feature names that are defined in the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Setup.xml file for command-line feature selection that will be selected for installation.

ISFeatureRemove

This property stores a comma-delimited list of feature names that are defined in the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Setup.xml file for command-line feature selection that will be selected for removal.

ISHiddenProperties

This property stores a semicolon-delimited list of case-sensitive property names whose values you do not want to be written to the debug log files. This property enables you to prevent properties that contain passwords and other sensitive information from being logged.

Note that ISHiddenProperties is useful for prevention of logging for values in the following scenarios:

The value of the property changes.
The end user sets the value of the property through command line when launching the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Setup.exe file.
The property is configured through a command line that the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation passes to a package. This is configurable in the Packages view, on the Common tab, in the Operation area.

If the property is logged through ISuiteExtension::LogInfo, the Suite engine cannot prevent the logging. Therefore, any code that you create to write a property value to the log file should read ISHiddenProperties to see whether the property value should be logged.

ISInstallMode

This read-only property stores a value that indicates the mode in which the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation is running. Possible values are:

0—First-time installation
1—Maintenance/UI maintenance mode selection
2—Maintenance/modify
3—Maintenance/remove
4—Maintenance/repair
5—Stage only (The installation is run in stage mode, in which the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation is staged—or uncompressed and copied to a specified location. Note that none of the packages in the installation are run in this mode.)

ISInstallProgress

This property stores the percentage of how much of the entire Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation has been completed. It is typically used for a progress circle control on the InstallationProgress wizard page.

ISInstallStatus

This property stores progress messages from the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation.

ISOnRebooted

If the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation is resuming after a reboot, this property is set to True.

ISParcelProgress

This property stores the percentage of how much of the currently running package installation has been completed. It is typically used for the Interior Property setting of the progress circle control.

ISPassword

If you configure your Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI release to be password protected, the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI user interface sets the ISPassword property. When the password is set and a password is populated in the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Setup.xml file, the value of this property is validated against the password from Setup.xml.

To learn more, see Password-Protecting an Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Installation.

ISPerformDelayedReboot

This property is set to True by the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI user interface if the target system should be restarted when the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation exits.

ISParcelStatus

This property stores progress messages from the currently running package.

ISRootStagePath

This property is used when the installation is run in stage mode. The property stores the path to the location where the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation is staged—or uncompressed and copied to a specified location.

ISSelectedLanguage

This property stores a string that contains the decimal language identifier of the language that the installation is currently displaying. Changing this property at run time, such as in the InstallationLanguage wizard page, changes the current language of the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation. You can use this property to set the language of the packages in your Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation.

ISSilentInstall

If the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation is running silently (without a user interface), this property is set to True.

ISUpdateAvailable

This property indicates whether an update for the currently running Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation is available for download. If an update is available, this property is set to 1.

To learn more, see Supporting Downloadable Updates for an Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Installation.

ISUpdateVersion

This property indicates the version of the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation that is available for download.

To learn more, see Supporting Downloadable Updates for an Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Installation.

Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI Folder Properties

The following properties define where files are stored or installed on the target system.

Advanced UI and Suite/Advanced UI Folder Properties

Property

Description

ISLogDir

If logging is enabled and configured for one or more of the packages in the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation, and if an end user launches the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation from the command line with the /log parameter, this property stores path to the directory that contains the package log files.

For more information, see Supporting the Creation of Package Log Files for Command-Line Launching of an Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Installation.

ISPREREQDIR

This property stores the path to an Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI package’s files when the package is staged, or copied to the target system for use temporarily during run time.

ORIGINALSETUPEXEDIR

This property stores the path to the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation’s Setup.exe file. For example, if the path to Setup.exe is C:\MySetups\MyApp\Setup.exe, the value of ORIGINALSETUPEXEDIR is C:\MySetups\MyApp.

ORIGINALSETUPEXENAME

This property identifies the name of the setup launcher file that was created when the project was built. The installation updates the value of this property at run time if the setup launcher file was renamed. The following path identifies the full path to this file:

[ORIGINALSETUPEXEDIR]\[ORIGINALSETUPEXENAME]

SETUPEXEDIR

This property stores the path to the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation’s Setup.exe file, typically a temporary location.

SETUPEXENAME

The installation updates the value of this property at run time if the setup launcher file was renamed. The following path identifies the full path to this file:

[SETUPEXEDIR]\[SETUPEXENAME]

SETUPSUPPORTDIR

This property stores the path to the folder that contains the support folders and files that are used temporarily by the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation at run time and then removed. This location is sometimes referred to as the default staging path. To refer to a file that is in the Language Independent node in the Support Files view, use the following syntax:

[SETUPSUPPORTDIR]\MyLanguageIndependentFile.txt

To refer to a file that is in one of the language-specific nodes in the Support Files view, include the language identifier in the path. For example, the language identifier for English is 1033:

[SETUPSUPPORTDIR]\1033\MyEnglishFile.txt

TempFolder

This property stores the path to the current temporary folder in the user context in which the Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI installation is running.

System Folder Properties

The following properties define paths to various folders on end users’ systems.

System Folder Properties

Property

Description

AdminToolsFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the end user’s folder that contains administrative tools.

AppDataFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the end user’s Application Data folder.

CommonAppDataFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the All Users Application Data folder.

CommonDocuments

The value of this property is the full path to the folder that contains documents that are common to all users.

CommonFilesFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the 32-bit Common Files folder.

CommonFiles64Folder

The value of this property is the full path to the 64-bit Common Files folder on 64-bit systems. This property is undefined on 32-bit systems.

LocalAppDataFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the folder that contains data files for local (non-roaming) applications.

PersonalFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the end user’s Personal folder.

ProgramFilesFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the end user’s Program Files folder. On 64-bit systems, this property refers to the 32-bit location.

ProgramFiles64Folder

The value of this property is the full path to the end user’s 64-bit Program Files folder. This property is undefined on 32-bit systems.

SystemFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the 32-bit system folder.

System64Folder

The value of this property is the full path to the 64-bit native system folder on 64-bit systems. This property is undefined on 32-bit systems.

WindowsFolder

The value of this property is the full path to the end user’s Windows folder.

See Also