One of my biggest pet-peeves in AI is the fact that there are certain features that I can select which will automatically change the installer from an MSI into an EXE, losing any MSI-related settings that I've done without warning. Undoing those changes usually doesn't restore the build type.

It would be really handy to have (or at least the option to have) a modal dialog appear confirming that it's okay to change the build type. In this particular case I have a requirement that the build be an MSI and having it automatically change means I falsely get the impression that a feature is supported for my required build type when it actually is not.

Hello,

Usually, when using something that requires changing the build to EXE, the user is notified. For instance, if you add a "pre-install" prerequisite (which requires EXE setup), you should be notified.

This also tells you what feature is requiring the EXE package, so you can revert it (in our case, remove pre-install prerequisites and then change the output from EXE to MSI in the "Builds" page).

Hope this helps!

Best regards,
Catalin

> Usually, when using something that requires changing the build to EXE, the user is notified.

I understand where you're coming from, but typically when you're going to make a destructive change, especially in a program where there is no undo capability, you don't just use a notification that's only on the screen temporarily. Typically you want to have a user confirmation that this is actually what they want to do.

Now, because you don't seem to have an undo system, I can understand that what I'm proposing is equally troublesome as you also can't "undo" what the user just did, but I can tell you that this is a real pain in the neck. I'm finding that this automatic change from msi to exe also removes any customization that I've done to the msi configuration. So if I've also told it that I wanted 2GB CAB's and that they should all be together in one folder by specifying the folder size as 16GB, all of that information also is removed, so just toggling back to MSI isn't enough, I have to also remember what those settings were.

P.S. - It's hard for me to fathom that after all these years, that you don't have a system for handling undo & redo built into the product. They're relatively easy to do and make the product that much more user friendly.

Hello,

Thank you for your followup on this and for sharing your feedback with us.

I am currently in the process of discussing this with our development team to see how we can improve our current behavior.

Best regards,
Catalin

Hello,

This improvement has been added in Advanced Installer 19.9, released on September 14th, 2022.

Best regards,
Catalin