Advanced Installer Express

The Express edition from Advanced Installer was publicly announced in March 2018 by Kevin Gallo, Microsoft CVP, as the official release partner for MSIX. Until the release of the MSIX Packaging Tool, it was the only tool that supported MSIX.

Advanced Installer Express is a free tool available to download from the Microsoft Store and gets constantly updated by the Advanced Installer team.

The powerful and easy to use GUI from Advanced Installer is the main characteristic of the Express edition. It helps create MSIX packages while educating the user. The tool is optimized to speed up MSIX adoption and brings considerable savings for enterprise packaging teams.

The Advanced Installer Express edition supports the following scenarios:

• Converting third-party packages to MSIX format.
• Creating MSIX packages from scratch (for your internal apps).
• Editing standalone MSIX packages using the advanced GUI.

In all of the above scenarios, you get the most powerful Package Support Framework integration on the market, including automatic fixup suggestions.

When you compare it with the MSIX Packaging Tool, the Express edition has practical capabilities that make MSIX packaging significantly easier.

• Automatic handling of command line (shortcut) arguments.
• Native interpretation of high-level constructs (FTAs, etc.) in the AppxManifest.
• Build-time validation of the package content for suitability.
• Project-based oriented workflow: reload, edit and rebuild yourMSIX package in seconds.
• Package Support Framework integration, with automated fixes.

For advanced capabilities, the commercial Architect edition from Advanced Installer brings virtual machine management/integration, team repositories, and all the standard MSI/App-V packaging tooling. You can read more about it on Advanced Installer.