avoid installer sign

[liuyt1]

hi, I want to add some string data (like download server IP) at the end of installer. But looks the the sign is signed, and change any byte will cause install fail.
Is it possible I can avoid sign the installer?

sign.png (37.29 KiB) Viewed 12887 times

[liuyt1]

I saw in this page
http://www.advancedinstaller.com/forums ... ign#p82515

It mentioned "By default Advanced Installer has its own DigiSign tool enabled to digitally sign the packages it creates."

Is there an option to disable DigiSign tool?

[liuyt1]

any update for this issue?

[Daniel]

Hello and welcome to Advanced Installer,

If you want not to sign your installation setup, then you should uncheck the "Enable signing" option from our "Digital Signature" page.

Also, if you want to sign your setup file, but not using our default "Digisign.exe" tool, then you can configure an external tool (e.g. Signtool.exe) to be used for signing from "File menu -> Options -> External Tools" menu option.

Let us know if this helped, otherwise please give us more details about your installation scenario?

All the best,
Daniel

[liuyt1]

Daniel, Thanks for your reply.
It is not working. No matter check/uncheck the "sign" check box, it always generate checksum at the end.
If you have any hex editor like ultraedit, you can reproduce this issue.

I also try to config one fake signer which do nothing, just return.
But in this case, advanced installer fail with "do not get signature" failure.

What I need is complete skip sign, since I need append some info at the end of installer at run time.

[Daniel]

Hello,

This may also happen if are building an EXE package type and enabled the "Sign and check integrity using MD5" option from "Builds page -> Configuration tab". So, can you please disable the above option and see if this works?

All the best,
Daniel

[liuyt1]

Daniel,

It is not working.
The issue happen if I select "single exe setup" in "builds"->"package type" config page.
If this case, advanced installer always generate checksum at the end and verify the checksum during install.

If change to "single msi", then it not generate checksum.

Can you help to take a look?

[liuyt1]

Daniel,

We do need the exe output. Can you help to check if any config/workaround for this issue?

Thanks,
YT

[Philm]

Here is a workaround:
I would consider using another setup.exe bootstrapper, it is not too complicated.
If you have prerequisites, I think with feature-based prereq. no AI setup.exe is needed? (I haven't tried out, but it would be logical for me).

One very easy alternative besides 7Zip selfextractors or others:

Just type IEXPRESS in the Windows command line. A quite unknown MS tool pops up- a built-in selfextracting tool. I can start a setup and pack everything to an .exe.
If you want another prereq solution, the most easiest way would be to start a batch file or VB/Powershell script at the end of the extract process containing calls to the prerequisites and your MSI(s).

If you want a more beautiful user interface than with such scripts calling multiple setups or prereqs:
As you may be aware, the AI setup.exe bootstrapper is quite primitive in it's dialog capabilities too. You could use the AI prerequisite lib, but you are not obliged to use that setup.exe .
With own bootstrappers, e.g. an own programmed one, Setup Factory, WiX Burn or others, you have many more options.
For easy things, the idea with IEXPRESS would be enough.
AI is a MSI specialist tool, but not specialized for calling and managing multiple setups (besides the good working prereq options). In fact I know several customers whose setup environment is (at least) two levels deep: They build a bunch of MSI files or setup.exe files and bundle them to a setup suite or bundle with an own full stack user interface. Take a look at Visual Studio or SQL Server, they work the same.

[liuyt1]

Philm,

I take a look for IEXPRESS. The function looks is limited.
We have spend two weeks to make AI working with our installer.
The installer need get few user input, install some service and start one exe to kill some process.
We have spend two weeks to make all these working.
If we switch to IEXPRESS, then all these effort lost.

If there any other option? Why we force run checksum generate and check?
Is there some bit we can overwrite to avoid these checking?
Or can I get some friendly from you team to avoid checksum?

Thanks,
YT

[liuyt1]

Philm and Daniel,

I try to use single MSI, instead of single EXE.
The good thing is AI does not generate checksum for MSI.
But there are two issues:
1) We defined several image in install dialog lost. These working fine with EXE solution.
2) We are not able to change the icon of MSI file. It show with default MSG icon.
Any idea for these two issues?

Thanks,
YT

[Daniel]

Hello YT,

I've talked with our development team about this and they said we do not allow any binary edit of our EXE setups outside of AI. This is a bad practice as may be error prone.

Can you please give us more details (maybe exemplify a bit) why would you need to append information to our binary EXE? Maybe we can suggest a workable solution.

All the best,
Daniel

[liuyt1]

Daniel,

Thanks for your reply.

We have client server application. And the server application will deploy on different domain.
User can download client application from server.
I need append server name at the end of the installer during user downloading the installer.
During installing, we will read the server name from the installer itself.
In this way, we can avoid the dialog "please input the server name".

Thanks,
YT

[liuyt1]

Daniel,

Also some questions for build single MSI approach.

1) We defined several image/icon in install dialog lost. These working fine with EXE solution.
2) We are not able to change the icon of MSI file. Is this by design?

Thanks,
YT

[liuyt1]

Daniel,

Append some data at the end of installer at run time is not practice.
Several application will append username at the end of installer after user sign up new account and download client application.
in this way, after client install, it can give default username.

There are several place is safe to add this information.
Like there is one useless string "This program cannot be run in DOS mode" in all exe.
Change that string should not cause any function issue.

The issue is checksum. Once it has checksum, all stop working.
Checksum should be optionally.

Thanks,
YT