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Want to create simple installers for Windows, for free (built-in to Windows)?

Note: This blog post is from 2008. Some content may be outdated--though not necessarily. Same with links and subsequent comments from myself or others. Corrections are welcome, in the comments. And I may revise the content as necessary.
If you have need to create a simplified installer (on Windows, for Windows), it turns out there's a built-in feature in Windows, called IEXPRESS, that does this for you.

It lets you package a set of files into an EXE which when run will show customized text prompts at the start and end, let the user pick the directory into which to extract, run a selected command at the start or end, and even optionally show a license they must agree to.

It turns out it's a feature that was implemented as part of the IE 6 Administration Kit (thus the IE part of the IExpress name), but I just tried it on Vista (with only IE 7 installed) and it worked just fine. Pretty nifty.

For more, see this blog entry at the awesome "Confessions of a Freeware Junkie" site. He also links there to a MS page that discusses the tool in more detail.

For more content like this from Charlie Arehart: Need more help with problems?
  • If you may prefer direct help, rather than digging around here/elsewhere or via comments, he can help via his online consulting services
  • See that page for more on how he can help a) over the web, safely and securely, b) usually very quickly, c) teaching you along the way, and d) with satisfaction guaranteed
Comments
NSIS is an open source installer from the same folks that make WinAmp, you'll probably see windows only installer for OpenBD from me sooner or later using NSIS. Again windows only though.

http://nsis.sourcefo...

For Mac SmithMicro used to give away free licenses to Stuffit InstallerMaker to share/freeware folks, not sure if they still do this or not.
Thanks, Adam.
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