Category: News – Visual Installer

We have added new conditions to Visual Installer’s script language that can be used to:

• check whether Microsoft Office is installed in the computer or not
• check if the installed Microsoft Office is 32 bit or 64 bit

This can be useful if you for example:

• install files that require that Microsoft Office is installed in the computer
• install files that require a specific bitness of Microsoft Office (for example 32 bit Office)
• want to install different files depending on the bitness of Microsoft Office

You can read more in this blog post:

> How to check if Microsoft Office is installed during an installation

When using the script language in Visual Installer, it may sometimes be useful to see in detail what happen when the script lines are executed. To get detailed information about the execution of script commands, you can activate a log function in Visual Installer’s script language. When the log is activated, detailed information about every script line that is executed are stored in a log file. Here you can see the contents of the parameters that are passed to the script commands and see the return value (for example error codes) of every command. If you use variables in the script (for example %DESTDIR) you can see their actual values.

How to activate the log function
To activate the log function, you can use the USELOG script command. To enable the log, enter the following in the beginning of your script code:

USELOG 1

As default, the log file is stored in the main destination folder of the installation (the folder path that is stored in the %DESTDIR variable) but you can also specify your own folder for the log file via parameter 2. For example:

USELOG 1, C:\MyLogFolder

To turn off the log, somewhere in the script, you can enter the following:

USELOG 0

If you want to log all lines in the script, you don’t need to turn off the log at the end. It will be turned off automatically after the last executed script line.

In the picture below, you can see an example of how the USELOG command can be used:

And below is an example of how the log file may look like:

If a script command succeeds, it returns OK. Otherwise it returns ERROR and an error code. Below is an example of how the log file may look like if an error occurs:

Most error codes can be found on this web page at Microsoft’s web site:

> Windows Dev Center: System Error Codes (0-499)

Some common error codes are:

2 : File not found!
3 : Path not found!
5 : Access denied!
183 : File already exists!

Filenames
The filename of the log file is Vinstall-Script–Before.log if the script lines are executed in the Before installation tab in the Execute script commands window in Visual Installer, and the filename is Vinstall-Script–After.log if the script lines are executed in the After installation tab in the same window. The filenames can not be changed, but you can change the folder where the log files are stored (as described above).

See also
> Visual Installer’s Scripting Language

In Visual Installer it is possible to block specific license keys from be accepted during an installation. This is useful when using prime number based license keys because they are created and verified mathematically. So if the license key is evaluated correctly, it will be accepted.

In Visual Installer you can create a block list with prime number based license keys that should not be accepted, although they are mathematically correct. This is done via the Block List dialog box in Visual Installer:

In this dialog box you can enter a list with license keys that should not be accepted by Visual Installer during an installation. The block list is stored per installation project and is saved with the .VIP project file. So it is not a global block list. It only adds the block list to the specific installation project.

Where to find the ‘Block List’ dialog box?
You can open the Block List dialog box by following these steps:

1. Open the Dialog boxes tab in Visual Installer’s editor.
2. Click on the “…” button to the right of the License key option.
3. Click on the More options button.
4. Click on the Block List button.

In the Block List dialog box that is now opened you can enter a list with license keys to block. One license key per row. You can also specify an information message that is shown to the user if he/she enters a blocked license key. If no text is specified, a default text is used.

Note
Both prime number based license keys and static license keys can be blocked with this method, although this function is most useful when used with prime number based license keys.

See also
> Visual Installer: Prime number based license keys
> Visual Installer can show visually when a license key is correct
> The setup wizard in Visual Installer

Since January 1, 2016, Windows 7 and newer Windows will no longer trust software that is signed with a SHA-1 code signing certificate, if the software is downloaded from the Internet and the software is time-stamped with a value greater than January 1, 2016. This means that if you code sign a binary file (for example an EXE file) this year and uses SHA-1 as a hash algorithm, it will not be trusted in newer Windows. Instead you must use a SHA-2 (SHA-256) code signing certificate; then the binary file will be trusted by Windows 7 and newer. You can read more about this in the following articles on Microsoft’s website:

> Windows Enforcement of Authenticode Code Signing and Timestamping
> Deprecation of SHA-1 Hashing Algorithm for Microsoft Root Certificate Program

Updated Visual Installer
We have updated our installation tool Visual Installer to support SHA-2 (SHA-256) when it code signs a setup package. We have also updated Visual Installer to support dual signing, so you can code sign a setup package with both SHA-1 and SHA-2. This is very useful if you have software that should be able to run also in older Windows (for example in Windows XP). By code signing a setup package twice, first with SHA-1 and then with SHA-2, your code sign certificate will be useful in both older Windows and newer Windows.

How to change hash algorithm from SHA-1 to SHA-2
In Visual Installer you can change the hash algorithm from SHA-1 to SHA-2, for an existing project, by following the steps below:

1. Start Visual Installer
2. Open your project
3. Choose the Special – Setup options menu item
4. Open the Code Signing tab in the Setup options dialog box
5. Open the Option sub tab
6. Select the Use SHA-2 option

7. Close the dialog box

If your minimum system requirements is Windows 7, you can use SHA-2 as a hash algorithm. But if you also want to support older Windows, follow the steps below:

How to dual sign a setup package (SHA-1 and SHA-2)
1. Start Visual Installer
2. Open your project
3. Choose the Special – Setup options menu item
4. Open the Code Signing tab in the Setup options dialog box
5. Open the Option sub tab
6. Select the Use SHA-1 and SHA-2 (recommended) option

7. Close the dialog box

When you open your project file
If you have installed the latest version of Visual Installer 2015 (version 10.5.16 or later) and opens a project file, you may see this message box when you open your project:

It is recommended to answer yes, so the latest version of Microsoft’s code signing tool is used when a setup package is code signed. If you want to dual sign a setup package, you must have a quite new version of the code signing tool. You can read more in this blog post.

Available in Visual Installer 2015 version 10.5.16 and later
The functionality described above is available in Visual Installer 2015 version 10.5.16 and later; in both the Standard and Professional versions of Visual Installer. If you have an active 1 or 12 months maintenance plan for Visual Installer 2015, you can download this update for free from our download page.

See also
> What is SHA-1 and SHA-2 and what’s the difference between them?
> How to code sign a setup package (Visual Installer tip)