4 ms·

But it had to solve some original problem (while maybe introducing others). Otherwise it wouldn't be used? From user's POV, I've always preferred IS installers

But it had to solve some original problem (while maybe introducing others). Otherwise it wouldn't be used? From user's POV, I've always preferred IS installers than Wise, but I haven't created any packages even once. I was always just the "next-next-finish"-type of user ;)

badsectoracula 4y ago
A cut down (but still very functional) version of Install Shield came bundled with Visual Studio, Delphi, C++ Builder and perhaps others (they were somewhat customized versions for each) so for many it was available out of the box. And the included version had a wizard to quickly create an installation project so unless you wanted something advanced, making an installer was a matter of selecting your program's files, the name of any Start menu shortcuts (and perhaps a couple of other things i forget) and then building the installer. For a ton of people it was more than enough. I think at the time its main "drawback" was that it made installer downloads from the internet a bit awkward since it generated tons of files, but many archiving tools (WinZip, WinRAR, etc) added options for making self-extracting archives that can launch applications, so the combo of a WinZip self-extracting archive that launches an InstallShield setup.exe was very common for a very long time. But basically the reason it was used a lot was that it was easily available to the users of the most popular development tools at the time.
deleted 4y ago
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pjc50 4y ago
It made you a standard executable Windows installer. Inexplicably there wasn't a decent first-party Microsoft solution to this until the Microsoft Store era. There wasn't really effective competition, probably because it's hard to get people to pay for developer tools and it's a hard problem to do well.
- zokier 4y ago
  Umm.. MSI has been a thing since Windows 2000, and WiX (and native support in VS) for creating those.

badsectoracula 4y ago

A cut down (but still very functional) version of Install Shield came bundled with Visual Studio, Delphi, C++ Builder and perhaps others (they were somewhat customized versions for each) so for many it was available out of the box. And the included version had a wizard to quickly create an installation project so unless you wanted something advanced, making an installer was a matter of selecting your program's files, the name of any Start menu shortcuts (and perhaps a couple of other things i forget) and then building the installer. For a ton of people it was more than enough. I think at the time its main "drawback" was that it made installer downloads from the internet a bit awkward since it generated tons of files, but many archiving tools (WinZip, WinRAR, etc) added options for making self-extracting archives that can launch applications, so the combo of a WinZip self-extracting archive that launches an InstallShield setup.exe was very common for a very long time. But basically the reason it was used a lot was that it was easily available to the users of the most popular development tools at the time.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

pjc50 4y ago

It made you a standard executable Windows installer. Inexplicably there wasn't a decent first-party Microsoft solution to this until the Microsoft Store era. There wasn't really effective competition, probably because it's hard to get people to pay for developer tools and it's a hard problem to do well.

zokier 4y ago
Umm.. MSI has been a thing since Windows 2000, and WiX (and native support in VS) for creating those.