Windows Installer XML (WiX) is a powerful XML-based definition language for defining how to build an MSI file. WiX is currently the only Microsoft-backed (they support all installer technologies, but they pay people to work on WiX) installer technology. Clearly it supports Windows Installer and MSI files. WiX, although backed by Microsoft, is open source and freely available.
Based on its name, WiX sounds like it would be a lot of manual editing of text (for example, XML) and doesn't sound very friendly. WiX (pronounced as wicks), as it is commonly known now, is a toolset. While WiX brings the concept of themed code-names to an all-time high, its core contains various components such as Candle, Light, Heat, Burn, Votive, Dark, Lit, Torch, Pyro, Melt, Smoke, and many more. This section describes the least advanced of these various components.
At the very least, using WiX involves compiling a source WiX file (.wxs
) with Candle to produce intermediate files, and...