In Part II of our series about setup projects, we're going to create an install for a slightly more difficult project - one that might be a little more like what you will need to do in the real world. Our project will still be a standard Windows application, and we're going to explore how to use what may be the most important 'designer' - the File System Editor. I introduced designers in Part I - they're the six functional ways that setup projects can be changed and they're represented by the six icons in the toolbar at the top of the Solution Explorer window when a Setup Project is selected. Since the real goal of most setups is to create a file system containing your system on the user's computer, the File System Editor designer may be the only one you have to use.
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If you haven't completed the previous articles in this series, now is a great time to do it.
The series was kicked off with an overview of what's great and new in Visual Basic 2005 deployment which introduces both ClickOnce and Setup Projects:
Install Your System with VB.NET 2.0
The second article explains the completely new ClickOnce tool for installing network based projects:
Using ClickOnce Deployment in VB.NET 2005
In the third article, we introduce the use of setup projects, the VB.NET 2005 implementation of Windows Installer based project deployment by explaining how a very simple Windows application can be installed using a setup project. Setup Project Deployment in VB.NET 2005 - Part I
In this example, I'll be using an application that I originally created for an earlier article: How To Use Resources in Visual Basic .NET. This simple application displays one of four graphics that are intended to represent the "four elements" that the Greek philosopher Aristotle wrote about when different radio buttons are clicked.
Click to download the complete project along with the setup project developed in this article.
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