WiX: Simple way to prompt user to install .NET pre-requisite - wix

Question

I currently have a working .msi built with WiX that has a user interface I'm quite happy with. The only thing missing is to detect for missing .NET 4.5 and either:
Install it using an embedded web setup, or
Direct the user to the .NET 4.5 download
The previous Setup and Deployment project I was using simply added it as a LaunchCondition with a URL and that worked well enough.
How can I add this to the WiX installer without resorting to a bootstrapper. From what I can tell using a bootstrapper like burn would require re-implementing a new user interface, likewise a tool like dotNetInstaller would also introduce a new UI.
If I can have the bootstrapper not implement it's own UI but trigger the .NET installation then open the msi's current user interface that would also work for me.

Answer 1

This is the code I ended up using... hasn't been through full testing yet!
Product.wxs:
...
<!-- custom actions -->
<InstallUISequence> <!-- .NET dialog runs only in UI mode and we skip it on the wrong platform so platform condition test is triggered later -->
<?if $(var.Platform) = x64 ?>
<Custom Action="InstallCA" Before="LaunchConditions">(NOT REMOVE~="ALL") AND NOT (Installed OR NETFRAMEWORK45) AND VersionNT64</Custom>
<?elseif $(var.Platform) = x86 ?>
<Custom Action="InstallCA" Before="LaunchConditions">(NOT REMOVE~="ALL") AND NOT (Installed OR NETFRAMEWORK45) AND NOT VersionNT64</Custom>
<?endif?>
</InstallUISequence>
</Product> <!-- end product -->
<Fragment>
<Binary Id="WiXCustomActions" SourceFile="$(var.WiXCustomActions.TargetDir)$(var.WiXCustomActions.TargetName).CA.dll" />
<CustomAction Id="InstallCA" BinaryKey="WiXCustomActions" DllEntry="DotNetCheck" Execute="firstSequence" />
</Fragment>
And the custom action (in a C# class library):
[CustomAction]
public static ActionResult DotNetCheck(Session session)
{
try
{
MessageBoxResult result = System.Windows.MessageBox.Show(
"This application requires that .NET Framework 4.5 is installed." + Environment.NewLine
+ "Would you like to open the Microsoft download page for" + Environment.NewLine + ".NET Framework 4.5?",
".NET Framework 4.5 is missing",
MessageBoxButton.YesNo, MessageBoxImage.Information, MessageBoxResult.No, MessageBoxOptions.DefaultDesktopOnly);
switch (result)
{
case MessageBoxResult.Yes:
System.Diagnostics.Process.Start("http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkId=245484");
break;
} //else just finish
}
catch (Exception ex)
{
session.Log("Error. " + ex.Message);
System.Windows.MessageBox.Show("Error:" + ex.Message);
}
return ActionResult.SkipRemainingActions;
}
It works good enough for me...

Answer 2

I also wanted to keep the UI from the MSI so I added this code to start an exe installer for hardware keys. I know it goes against MSI Best Practices but this is the only one I intend on breaking. Hope this helps.
<Property Id="WixShellExecTarget" Value="[#myapplication.exe]" />
<CustomAction Id="LaunchApplication" BinaryKey="WixCA" DllEntry="WixShellExec" Impersonate="yes" />
I then ran the custom action from a button click. You could spawn an error dialog with a download button on it and link it via that. Not very elegant at all but it works for me and my company as a work around..:)
EDIT: you could also use this code from a button click to launch the URL for the download, the Value attribute having the full hyperlink.

Answer 3

And one important things, when you will be creating this DLL lib
And the custom action (in a C# class library):
Need to add next References:
using WixSharp
using Microsoft.Deployment.WindowsInstaller
using System.Windows.Forms
also replace "MessegeBoxResult" to "DialogResult" and MessegeBox should get from class System.Windows.Forms