[wix-devs] v4 - which .NET Framework?

[Bob Arnson]

I'd put it this way: As we're not (currently) targeting later than .NET 4.0 anyway, we can take advantage of that to avoid requiring a later version of the Framework in our installer. If we chose to target a later framework, I wouldn't say we should avoid doing so just because it streamlines the installer. (And I don't care in the slightest for Vista; it's still in extended support but Microsoft is ignoring it even for non-dev products like Office.)

The 4.5.2 redist will install on Windows 8+. The 4.6.x redists will fail if on Windows 8.1 and KB2919355 isn't installed.

Not understanding the question on v4.0...?

-----Original Message-----
From: wix-devs [mailto:wix-devs-bounces at lists.wixtoolset.org] On Behalf Of Sean Hall
Sent: Tuesday, 2 August, 2016 15:01
To: WiX Toolset Developer Mailing List <wix-devs at lists.wixtoolset.org>
Subject: Re: [wix-devs] v4 - which .NET Framework?

Let me see if I understand.  Our low bar is VS2010 which corresponds to .NET 4.0.  Since we want to avoid upgrading someone's .NET, that means that our compile target is .NET 4.0.  Even though VS2010 works on XP, we're not supporting XP (note: we're not blocking it today) and only supporting Vista
SP2+ (because it's still supported by Microsoft today?).  Since 4.5.2 is
currently supported on all of our supported OS's, that's what we'll set as the Prereq package in our bundle (note: this package will only work on Vista/7, missing .NET 4 on 8+ means that a Windows feature needs to be installed).  We'll modify the InstallCondition to only install if the prereq BA is running.  We're going to switch to the full redist package because the web redist for 4.5.2 is actually less efficient that the full redist when it needs to be installed (note: to counteract this, we need to make the package always uncompressed otherwise our bundle is going to be huge).

Question for the future: what happens if we ship v4.0 after Vista and/or
4.5.2 loses support?

On Tue, Aug 2, 2016 at 12:13 PM, Bob Arnson <bob at firegiant.com> wrote:

> 4.6 is still supported:
> https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dotnet/2015/12/09/support-ending-for-
> the-net-framework-4-4-5-and-4-5-1/
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: wix-devs [mailto:wix-devs-bounces at lists.wixtoolset.org] On 
> Behalf Of Rob Mensching
> Sent: Tuesday, 2 August, 2016 13:08
> To: WiX Toolset Developer Mailing List <wix-devs at lists.wixtoolset.org>
> Subject: Re: [wix-devs] v4 - which .NET Framework?
>
> We could install many different versions of .NET Framework in the 
> Bundle but I was trying to keep it simpler than that. We don't support 
> installing WiX Toolset on XP. So Vista is the lowest bar. My 
> understanding is v4.6.0 isn't supported. So if v4.6.1 doesn't support 
> Vista I think the simple answer is v4.5.2 everywhere. I'd only really 
> want to do the more complicated scenario below if there isn't a single 
> .NET Framework that supports all our target OS's (aka: Vista+).
>
> As for not up to date machines, we should either solve the problem or 
> ensure there is a good error message in mbapreq. This is the same 
> experience everyone else uses so it might as well be good.
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: wix-devs [mailto:wix-devs-bounces at lists.wixtoolset.org] On 
> Behalf Of Sean Hall
> Sent: Tuesday, August 2, 2016 8:42 AM
> To: WiX Toolset Developer Mailing List <wix-devs at lists.wixtoolset.org>
> Subject: Re: [wix-devs] v4 - which .NET Framework?
>
> If we're going to target a lower version of .NET than the one that the 
> bundle includes, then there's no reason for us to pick only one 
> version of .NET for the bundle.  We can set it up such that it 
> installs .NET 4.0 on XP SP3, .NET 4.6 on Vista SP2, and .NET 4.6.1 on Win 7 SP1 and later.
>
> The question then becomes, what happens when there is no 4.x version 
> of .NET installed on the machine and the version of .NET we have in 
> the bundle can't be installed on the current OS.  For instance, 4.6.1 
> cannot be installed on completely unpatched versions of Windows (I 
> don't remember off the top of my head which ones), it requires one (or 
> more) Windows Updates and/or service packs.  Do we just pop up a 
> message saying that they need to update their OS?  Do we ask them to 
> enable the .NET feature in Windows, or add functionality to burn to do it ourselves?
>
> Also, Phill mentioned switching to a Redist version.  I'm not sure 
> where that came from, or why we would want to do that.  If that's 
> because of layout, then I think there's a feature that could be 
> written for Burn where it can support using a Web version for install 
> and a Redist version for layout.
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