Happy 234th Birthday Marines!

Oohrah my fellow Marines!

InstallAware Give Away Results

I'd like to thank Sinan at InstallAware for his generous offer of a InstallAware Developer license to readers of this blog. The offer started on Tuesday and went until Friday. During that period this blog had 1379 page loads from 859 unique visitors. Sinan Karaca reports to me that they gave away 56 free licenses worth $83,944.00.

In other news, the Federal Trace Commission has adopted new guidelines that requires blogs to disclose endorsement compensation. As such I've posted an official disclosure stating the position of this blog. In summary, this blog has never and will never accept any form of compensation. We will however pass on swag opportunities to our readers when given the chance.

InstallAware Complimentary License Announcement

Update: Per Sinan, this offer has expired.

In a recent blog comment, Sinan Karaca posted:

In fact, anybody reading this blog and wanting to check out just how revolutionary InstallAware is, send sales at installaware.com an email with the subject "Painter License" and we'll send out a complimentary Developer license your way. Till this Friday only :)

Cheers,
Sinan

Well, who am I to pass up an opportunity for my readers to get a free copy of InstallAware? So if you feel like trying something new to fire off your email request.

Note: InstallAware requires a non-anonymous email address ( no gmail, yahoo, msn ) and DeploymentEngineering.com is not affialated with InstallAware and has no role or responsibility in this give away promotion.

InstallAware Uninstall Problem

I was reading a news release where InstallAware boasted:

"InstallAware setups power the installation of the Activation Assistant for Microsoft Office 2007, pre-installed by OEMs on millions of laptops around the world," says Sinan Karaca, founder of InstallAware Software Corporation.

I decided to google "Activation Assistant for Microsoft Office 2007" and the results indicate that millions of people around the world can't get this software removed from their box. Way to go Microsoft and InstallAware! I don't have access to the installer, but from the symptoms I'm reading, it sounds like somebody forgot to listen to sage advice of always including "or Installed" in their LaunchConditions.

Anyways, the install issue caught the attention of PCWorld. Here's a snippet of the write up that is really worth reading.

Activation Assistant's Dirty Little Secret

It turns out that the Activation Assistant for Office 2007 has been a serious hassle for Microsoft. According to Joe, the Activation Assistant accounts for the great majority of tech-support calls. He wasn't specific, but said that the program is basically flawed. Apparently there's a fix coming in Office 14.

In fact, the Activation Assistant is so troublesome that when I suggested that we just reinstall the dang thing, he flat-out refused. He said that would likely cause more problems--and I don't argue with escalation managers...

So maybe InstallAware should dig a little deeper when trying to reference "successful" projects.

InstallAware resorts to Sex Appeal

It's an old adage that "sex sells" in marketing. But surely there is no space less sexy then setup development tools, right?

Well, it seems InstallAware has sunken to new lows by engaging with marketing partners to spam the twittersphere using what I can only assume are astroturfing fake profiles. Their PR angle is that they a shining example of stability in light of InstallShields multiple name changes.

Hmmm. Based on the comments, emails and threads that I've been shown InstallAware could actually use a good corporate identity change right now. The level of customer disservice (including rude attacks against customers ) that I've witnessed has been horrific.

MSDN Goes Blue

Enough said?

Goodbye Acresso, We Hardly Knew Ye

I read the news today that Acresso is changing it's name to Flexera.

Huh? Why?

As if the makers of InstallShield hadn't already done enough damage to their brand, let's just go change names yet again!


BTW, Flexera is already taken by a company in the alternative energy market. Anyone want to take a guess which one of these companies actually stands a chance of being in a high growth market for the next ten years?

MSSE Validation Errors

I recently downloaded Microsoft's new Security Essentials Suite and I decided to take a look at how it's installer is constructed.

My first observation is how they once again use an external UI to get around the fact that Windows Installer does such a poor job at localization.

Then I ran MSI validation and discovered the following gem.

ICE08 ERROR Component: SetupResMui_NLNL has a duplicate GUID: {1230940F-EB02-47B7-ACFF-D0E76871D928}
ICE08 ERROR Component: MsMpResDll has a duplicate GUID: {8FEE8260-3507-417A-AF09-1C24F341FA14}
ICE08 ERROR Component: shellextDllMui_ZHCN has a duplicate GUID: {A5F76683-9CAE-4F3F-B4FD-1668EB2C3FAD}
ICE08 ERROR Component: SetupResMui_PTBR has a duplicate GUID: {D0D868D8-EC9D-423F-AF62-345A4EEFE3C3}

I'm afraid to even ask. :-)

Configuration Manager In Training

I don't talk about my family life much but today my daughter Ashley ( Age 6 in 1st grade ) wrote the cutest thing: A french toast recipe!

See, I work a lot during the week ( probably too more then I should ) and on weekends I typically do the cooking. Very often I'll make french toast since they are always asking for it. It's a real big hit.

I was sitting at work today when I received this picture and it just warmed my heart. Milk, Eggs, Sugar, Nutmeg, Cinnamon, Mix it up and grill it with love followed by happy!

Awww, too cute.

Anyways, I can tell this kid is going to love Build/CM. :-)

Finally, here's the real recipe

16 slices thin white bread slightly stale( none of that wheat stuff mommy likes )
1 cup of egg beaters
1 cup of milk
1/2 cup of sugar
1 tsp vanilla ( life is too short for artificial )
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg

Stir briskly with a whisk, drip bread and cook on a griddle coated with PAM heated to 325f. Serve with "daddy eggs" ( eggs over easy @ 375f with REAL butter ) and bacon.