Libs, binary libs, and merge modules are all about code structure and reuse. I once worked for a company that at it's peak had 250 developers and 2 install developers. Our business model was built around a concept called "Product Line". Think if it like a car manufacturer who has different vehicle platforms, engines, transmissions, electronics packages, options and how this all comes together to make different models and trims of vehicles.
We had about 20 different products where a typical product had 12,000 - 15,000 files. This was organized into about 150 features split out over 15 service families. Each service family would have 10 - 20 merge modules with various merge module dependencies. This created a feature free and merge module tree that a new product could look at and make their selections and contribute to the product line, domain or product libraries as needed. We "democratized" the entire process so that developers could self service their merge modules, software leads could self service their portion of the feature tree and product leads could compose their own installers. The two remaining install engineers were only engaged for upcoming architecture reviews and tactical problem solving (which became rare). All of this was made possible using WiX merge modules and in our case an InstallShield installer. However if we chose a WiX installer we could have dumped the merge modules and went with wix libs. ---------------------------------------- From: "Nicolás Alvarez" <nicolas.alva...@gmail.com> Sent: Monday, September 30, 2013 10:58 PM To: "General discussion for Windows Installer XML toolset." <wix-users@lists.sourceforge.net> Subject: [WiX-users] Practical use of wixlibs I can't find any documentation on best-practices when creating either merge modules or wixlibs, only procedure documentation on how to create them. Let's say I create a wixlib (or msm) with multiple components that make up a large C++ library. Someone making an application with that library can then use the wixlib and only write installation code for his own app files, instead of having to also define the installation of the library. But where would the library be installed? Would the wixlib need to have a Directory under (say) Common Files where the library would go? Or can the wixlib provide a way for the application wxs to decide where the library would be installed? But then there's a problem: two applications importing the same wixlib could install the same components (with same GUID) in different directories. As far as I know that means only the first one would get installed, the second would see the component is already installed (identified by GUID) and do nothing. Does anyone have experiences to share? -- Nicolás ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ October Webinars: Code for Performance Free Intel webinars can help you accelerate application performance. Explore tips for MPI, OpenMP, advanced profiling, and more. Get the most from the latest Intel processors and coprocessors. See abstracts and register > http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=60134791&iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk _______________________________________________ WiX-users mailing list WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ October Webinars: Code for Performance Free Intel webinars can help you accelerate application performance. Explore tips for MPI, OpenMP, advanced profiling, and more. Get the most from the latest Intel processors and coprocessors. See abstracts and register > http://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/clk?id=60134791&iu=/4140/ostg.clktrk _______________________________________________ WiX-users mailing list WiX-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/wix-users
