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Deployment Wizard wishes

4,726

We were surprised and unhappy to learn from Sybase support that if you create an installer with the Deployment Wizard, then you can't simply apply downloaded EBFs. That's a real maintenance inconvenience, especially if we need to apply an EBF quickly. EBFs do a nice job of seeing what you've got installed and only updating what it needs to, so this is was a surprising limitation. Yes, there's are workarounds, but for us they aren't worth it.

Combined with the fact that the Deployment Wizard doesn't support 64-bit installations (and we want to support both) means that we're backing away from the Deployment Wizard.

Too bad. It's a nice feature. I hope that, in the future, these two limitations go away.

FWIW, Dan K.

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Thanks, Chris. That's very encouraging. I'm not spotting the relevant change in the SQL Anywhere Bug Fix Readme for Version 11.0.1, build 2405. Do you have any more details?

VolkerBarth
Contributor
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@Chris: Thanks for clarifying your statements (though the original answer looked more friendly). So it seems that the restriction "You can't EBF a Wizard-deployed install" is going to hold for V11 and future versions, too?

Chris_Kleisath
Participant

@Volker: Yes, the restriction will hold for v11 and the future v12. I would like to add some additional comments: In our "dream" world, MANY OEM partners will be creating installs based on SQL Anywhere. Each one of those installs should be able to co-exist on a single computer, and have the ability for individual uninstalls, etc. To allow for this, the deployment wizard does not create "SQL Anywhere" installations, it creates "OEM Custom" installations. At the moment, our EBF installations will only update a "SQL Anywhere" installation.

justin_willey
Participant

@Chris I understand the concern about multiple partners' configurations, but in our ideal world there would be a published standard - if a custom install conformed it could be updated by an iAnywhere issued ebf, if not then not. Additionally an OEM partner could indicate in an install that it should not be updated by an ebf.

Accepted Solutions (1)

Accepted Solutions (1)

VolkerBarth
Contributor

While I generally agree with your suggestions:

That's what I do to "upgrade" a client installed by a Deployment Wizard package:

I apply the EBF to the "Source box" and then re-run the Deployment Wizard to create the same package as before (i.e. with the same set of options). (That has me lead to ask if those options could not be stored or if the Wizard could be scripted.)

The new package can then be applied to upgrade the clients.

I guess that the resulting package won't be much bigger than a full EBF (and possibly MSM packages might be even smaller - however, I have not used them so far.)

(Sidenote: I have used this primarily to upgrade clients with just client interfaces.)

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Thanks for the feedback, Volker!

Unfortunately, that approach doesn't work as well for us: - We need to deploy both 32-bit and 64-bit servers and clients, so Deployment Wizard isn't a good option. (We'd like one approach that works for both.) - We're a regulated medical device, so software we generate goes through a QA and release process. If we can't "just use" Sybase's EBF installer, we introduce a delay in using it to create our own revised installer. That's a problem on a rush EBF.

So, we wish we could do an install that would let us just apply an EBF.

(continued...)

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To make matters worse, the Silent Install option of the standard installer only does a full install, so that's not an option, either.

It looks like our only option is to roll our won custom installer, and re-release it for each EBF. Gaaaaaaaaa!

VolkerBarth
Contributor
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Well, with version 8 we have used the InstallShield Silent setup option to record our customized installation options (with setup.exe -r and -f1..., IIRC) that could then be replayed with setup.exe -s. I don't know if this is works with newer version but I think it should. - Would this be a solution?

VolkerBarth
Contributor
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To add: I have used similar steps as described in the V 10 docs, cf. http://dcx.sybase.com/index.html#html/dbpgen10/pg-using-silent-install-deploy.html - but as said, I don't know if those apply to V 11.0.1 as well.

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Thanks, Volker. That is almost certainly what we will do.

Answers (3)

Answers (3)

Former Member

Part of the problem lies with the technology we use for the installs,

Look at SetupBuilder from Lindersoft. It is all script driven ... and you have far more control over the installation than any other installation system available.

Former Member

Please, Please - I find this more than an annoyance.

With over 600+ installations, and a support department in many different countries, we want our support staff to make sure clients are running the latest EBF without the aid of the development staff creating EBF's.

EBF's come out constantly, and more importantly, once development moves on to V12, V13, V14 of Sybase, we still need the current EBF to be able to be installed without having to go back and create a deployment.

I honestly believe that Sybase needs to make this happen ... but it should be easy, and you can use SetupBuilder (Lindersoft) to do this - they can do anything.

Simply if the object exists, replace it during an EBF install.

This is a huge issue for us. It needs to be looked at seriously and resolved.

VolkerBarth
Contributor
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I think Justin's suggestion in his comment on Chris's answer could be a solution here, i.e. the possibility to create a "standard installation" with the Wizard that can then be EBF'ed lateron.

VolkerBarth
Contributor
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FWIW, starting with SA 12, the Deployment Wizard can now be used to create both 32-bit and 64-bit deployments for Windows.

Cf. http://dcx.sybase.com/index.html#1200en/dbprogramming/deploy-s-4228164.html, particularly Jack Schueler's comment.