patching using purely WIX - wix

Question

I am struggling with creating a patch purely using WIX and I was hoping if someone could guide me in the right direction.
I have a few hundred source files and I run heat against them to create a harvest file followed by creating a package using candle and light.
I need to change a few configuration files and I create a 2nd package with the changes.
Using Torch and pyro I create the .wixmst file and then when trying to create the msp file, pyro complains with the following error.
pyro.exe : error PYRO0252 : No valid transforms were provided to attach to the patch. Check to make sure the transforms you passed on the command line have a matching baseline authored in the patch. Also, make sure there are differences between your target and upgrade.
my question really is: what should patch.wxs contain?
Here is what my patch.wxs looks like:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<Wix xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/wix/2006/wi">
<Patch
AllowRemoval="yes"
Manufacturer="sample llc"
MoreInfoURL="sample.com"
DisplayName="Env Patch"
Description="Env Specfic Patch"
Classification="Update"
>
<Media Id="5000" Cabinet="RTM.cab">
<PatchBaseline Id="RTM" />
</Media>
<PatchFamilyRef Id="EnvPatchFamily" />
</Patch>
<Fragment>
<PatchFamily Id='EnvPatchFamily' Version='1.0.0.0' ProductCode="PUT-GUID-HERE" Supersede='yes' >
**********************************************
What component Ref should I put in here
heat creates a component group and I can't
put ComponentGroupRef in here
**********************************************
</PatchFamily>
</Fragment>
</Wix>
I am using Wix patching as described in this link:
http://wix.sourceforge.net/manual-wix3/wix_patching.htm
However, it doesn't consider source wix file created using heat.
Can someone tell me what am I doing wrong here?

Answer 1

Hitesh,
For me heat creates a component group like this:
<Fragment>
<ComponentGroup Id="MyFiles">
<ComponentRef Id="cmp2AA1A30564C621322ECB3CDD70B1C03C" />
<ComponentRef Id="cmp788C978F16E473D4FD85720B5B75C207" />
</ComponentGroup>
</Fragment>
heat command:
"%WIX%\bin\heat.exe" dir slndir\bin\Release -cg MyFiles -gg -scom -sreg -sfrag -srd -dr INSTALLDIR -out ..\Wix\MyFiles.wxs -var var.BinOutputPath -nologo -v -ke -t wixtransform.xsl
And in patch.wxs:
<Fragment>
<PatchFamily Id='ProductPatchFamily' Version='1.3.0.0' Supersede='yes'>
<ComponentRef Id="cmp2AA1A30564C621322ECB3CDD70B1C03C" />
<ComponentRef Id="cmp788C978F16E473D4FD85720B5B75C207" />
</PatchFamily>
</Fragment>
Take care: there is no ProductCode attribute in PatchFamily tag

Answer 2

I would also like to mention that PatchFamily elements are optional when building a patch, and are intended to allow fine grained control over exactly what will get patched. In most cases I find that I want to include all differences between 2 versions of an MSI when building a patch, in which case I omit the PatchFamily altogether. In your case, the resulting patch WXS would look like the following:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<Wix xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/wix/2006/wi">
<Patch
AllowRemoval="yes"
Manufacturer="sample llc"
MoreInfoURL="sample.com"
DisplayName="Env Patch"
Description="Env Specfic Patch"
Classification="Update"
>
<Media Id="5000" Cabinet="RTM.cab">
<PatchBaseline Id="RTM" />
</Media>
</Patch>
</Wix>
I hope this answer helps anyone with a similar question, that is not wanting to manually construct patch families, not wanting to manually includeComponentRef every time they need to build a patch.

Answer 3

I faced the same issue, the fix for this error is to add the GUID to the component and it should remain same for both the versions of msi.
<MajorUpgrade DowngradeErrorMessage="A newer version of [ProductName] is already installed." />
<MediaTemplate />
<Feature Id="ProductFeature" Title="WixPatch" Level="1">
<ComponentGroupRef Id="ProductComponents" />
</Feature>
</Product>
<Fragment>
<Directory Id="TARGETDIR" Name="SourceDir">
<Directory Id="ProgramFilesFolder">
<Directory Id="INSTALLFOLDER" Name="WixPatch" />
</Directory>
</Directory>
</Fragment>
<Fragment>
<ComponentGroup Id="ProductComponents" Directory="INSTALLFOLDER" >
<Component Id="File1" **Guid="3A64BE7A-BBEC-40AD-8319-45C602734146"**>
<File Source="D:\V2\File1.txt" Name="File1" KeyPath="yes" DiskId="1" Id="F1"/>
</Component>
</ComponentGroup>
</Fragment>