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Date
1-02-2012 Upgrade and
Content Owner
Vishal Paterya
Patches
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Session Objectives
Summary:
This course will enable you to understand :
• Concept of Upgrading
• How it is done
• What Patches are and how they are applied.

Day Wise Duration:

Day 1:
• Upgrading Concept
• How to Upgrade an existing application.
• Its benefits.
• What are patches
• How to apply patches

Target Audience:
IT Engineers with basic information on Operating system and Windows Installer..

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Upgrading Concept
All Software evolves over every release. So it become compelling for system
administrator to make sure all software used with in an organization are latest
version.

To accomplish this task admin have to keep Upgrading the installed application.
Many vendor supplied MSI’s for e.g. Adobe Reader, handles upgrading on there
own. In contrast, legacy application provides no such facility.

Such application requires to be packaged in a way that they upgrade existing lower
version to current version.

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Type of Upgrade

Type of Product Product Package Remark

update Code Version Code
Small - - Changed An update to one or two files. The package code in the
Update Revision Number Summary Property does change. Can be
shipped as a full installation package or as a Patch
package.
Minor - Changed Changed A small update making changes significant enough.
Upgrade Shipped as a full installation package or as a Patch
package.
Major Changed Changed Changed A comprehensive update of the product. Shipped as a
Upgrades patch package or as a full Product installation package.

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Scenario
WinZip 8.1 is currently being used in an organization. Now a new version of this
application is available, and it has to be installed in all the machines.

New version available is a legacy application so how to proceed?

1. Convert this application to a packaged MSI.

2. Test that new application is working fine after capturing.
3. Once packager is satisfied with the functionality make use of Upgrade table.

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Upgrade Table
Following is a view of Upgrade Table.

Every column has its significance

• UpgradeCode
• VersionMin
• VersionMax
• Language
• Attributes
• Remove
• ActionProperty

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Upgrade Table Description
UpgradeCode: The UpgradeCode property in this column specifies the upgrade code
of all products that are to be detected by the FindRelatedProducts action.

VersionMin: VersionMinLower boundary of the range of product versions detected by

FindRelatedProducts. Enter msidbUpgradeAttributesVersionMinInclusive in Attributes
to include VersionMin in the range. If VersionMin equals an empty string ("") it is
evaluated the same as 0. If VersionMin is null, FindRelatedProducts ignores
msidbUpgradeAttributesVersionMinInclusive and detects all previous versions.
VersionMin and VersionMax must not both be null.
VersionMin must be a valid product version as described for the ProductVersion
property. Note that Windows Installer uses only the first three fields of the product
version. If you include a fourth field in your product version, the installer ignores the
fourth field.

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Upgrade Table Description
VersionMax: VersionMaxUpper boundary of the range of product versions detected by
the FindRelatedProducts action. Enter MsidbUpgradeAttributesVersionMaxInclusive in
Attributes to include VersionMax in the range. If VersionMax is an empty string (""), it
is evaluated the same as 0. If VersionMax is null, FindRelatedProducts ignores
msidbUpgradeAttributesVersionMaxInclusive and detects all product versions greater
than (or greater than or equal to) the lower boundary specified by VersionMin and
msidbUpgradeAttributesVersionMinInclusive. VersionMin and VersionMax must not
both be null.
VersionMax must be a valid product version as described for the ProductVersion
property. Note that Windows Installer uses only the first three fields of the product
version. If you include a fourth field in your product version, the installer ignores the
fourth field.
Language: The set of languages detected by “FindRelatedProducts”. Enter a list of
numeric language identifiers (LANGID) separated by commas. Enter
“msidbUpgradeAttributesLanguagesExclusive” in Attributes to detect all languages
exclusive of those listed in Language. If Language is null or an empty string (""),
“FindRelatedProducts” ignores “msidbUpgradeAttributesLanguagesExclusive” and
detects all languages.
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UpgradeTable Description
Attributes: This column contains bit flags specifying attributes of the Upgrade table.

Bit flag name Decimal Hexadecimal Hexadecimal

msidbUpgradeAttribute 1 0x001 Migrates feature states by enabling the logic in
sMigrateFeatures the MigrateFeatureStates action.
msidbUpgradeAttribute 2 0x002 Detects products and applications but does not
sOnlyDetect remove.
msidbUpgradeAttribute 4 0x004 Continues installation upon failure to remove a
sIgnoreRemoveFailure product or application.

msidbUpgradeAttribute 256 0x100 Detects the range of versions including the

sVersionMinInclusive value in VersionMin.
msidbUpgradeAttribute 512 0x200 Detects the range of versions including the
sVersionMaxInclusive value in VersionMax.
msidbUpgradeAttribute 1024 0x400 Detects all languages, excluding the languages
sLanguagesExclusive listed in the Language column.

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UpgradeTable Description
Remove: The installer sets the REMOVE property to features specified in this
column. The features to be removed can be determined at run time. The Formatted
string entered in this field must evaluate to a comma-delimited list of feature
names. For example: [Feature1],[Feature2],[Feature3]. No features are removed if
the field contains formatted text that evaluates to an empty string (""). The installer
sets REMOVE=ALL only if the Remove field is empty. Note the difference between
an empty string and empty field. If the field is empty, it is null.

ActionProperty: When the FindRelatedProducts action detects a related product

installed on the system, it appends the product code to the property specified in
this field. The property specified in this column must be a public property and the
package author must add the property to the SecureCustomProperties property.
Each row in the Upgrade table must have a unique ActionProperty value. After
FindRelatedProducts, the value of this property is a list product codes, separated by
semicolons (;), detected on the system

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Questions and Answers
1. Why Upgrade is necessary?
2. What is the content of ActionPropety column?
3. What Attribute will be set if you want to include VersionMin, VersionMax and
make sure installation continues upon failure to remove a product or
application?

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What is a Patch?
A patch is a small piece of software that is used to correct a problem with a
software program or an operating system. Patches are often called "fixes."

Service packs usually contain many different patches.

Most major software companies will periodically release patches, usually

downloadable from the Internet, that correct very specific problems in their
software programs.

File extension for a patch is

.msp

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How to apply a patch?
Patch can be applied by following ways:

1. Using a commandline “msiexec /p <path to .msp>”

2. Patching a MSI via admin installation “msiexec /a <path to MSI> /p <path to

.msp>”

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Questions and Answers
1. What is a patch?
2. What is admin Installation?
3. Is patch a type of upgrade?
4. What are types of upgrade?
5. What is a SecureCustomProperty?
6. Why upgrade is done?

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COMMERCIAL IN CONFIDENCE © Copyright 2011 ECS Europe Limited