Comments on DeploymentEngineering.com - The Blog: InstallShield 2009 Beta Part II ( Managed CA's )

I once read an article about a pure managed code p...

2009-03-12T15:37:00.000-05:00

I once read an article about a pure managed code prototype operating system and I've even had wierd dreams about hardware that emulates the VM so that IL becomes the new Assembly.

He he. Yeah. I had the same dreams many years ago when Sun announced the JavaOS and the Sun JavaStations. Very sad that it died a horrible crib death. Could have been insanely great ;-)

Yes, that's exactly what I was referring to. Ther...

2008-04-01T07:46:00.000-05:00

Yes, that's exactly what I was referring to. There is an interesting video on it over at http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=68302

Singularity ( http://research.microsoft.com/os/Sin...

2008-04-01T07:40:00.000-05:00

Singularity ( http://research.microsoft.com/os/Singularity/ ) is pretty close to what you were talking about.

I did learn ( and actually use once upon a time ) ...

2008-03-27T14:03:00.000-05:00

I did learn ( and actually use once upon a time ) ANSI C back in the 90's. Pointers are fun, and important to understand, but for Windows development even Rob has to notice that you can now get hired at Microsoft without being able to write C/C++.

I once read an article about a pure managed code prototype operating system and I've even had wierd dreams about hardware that emulates the VM so that IL becomes the new Assembly.

C/C++ is still a good skill to have, even if in th...

2008-03-26T14:10:00.000-05:00

C/C++ is still a good skill to have, even if in the narrow focus of the Windows Installer realm. But yeah...
foo = Session.Property("BAR")

...is certainly a lot simpler than:
TCHAR* szPropBuf = NULL;
DWORD cchPropBuf = 0;
UINT uiRet = MsiGetProperty(hInstall, TEXT("MYPROP"), TEXT(""), &cchPropBuf);
if (uiRet == ERROR_MORE_DATA)
{
++cchPropBuf;
szPropBuf = new TCHAR[cchPropBuf];
if (szPropBuf)
{
uiRet = MsiGetProperty(hInstall, TEXT("MYPROP"), szPropBuf, &cchPropBuf);
}
}
if (uiRet != ERROR_SUCCESS)
{
if (szPropBuf != NULL)
delete [] szPropBuf;
wsprintf (msg, L"Error retrieving the MYPROP property: %s", uiRet);
LogMessage(hInstall, msg);
return ERROR_INSTALL_FAILURE;
}

OUTSTANDING! I've been putting off learning C bec...

2008-03-22T22:48:00.000-05:00

OUTSTANDING! I've been putting off learning C because I feel managed code is the future. Now, if only the MSI team would get their act together and support this natively.

Oh man, that's awesome. I am going to have to dow...

2008-03-20T16:56:00.000-05:00

Oh man, that's awesome. I am going to have to download the beta and give this a whirl.