Windows Installer Hacking

2006-11-22T11:30:48Z

Spike: /* Component.idt */

This page explains how to modify a Windows installer EXE (the big, >70 MB one which contains everything).

== Why? ==

Normally this is a bad idea, and it is better to build OOo from scratch
yourself. However, this may not be possible for various reasons, e.g. if:

* You don't have the (non-Free) toolchain available to build OOo.
* You're modifying a non-Free OOo derivative and don't have the source.
* You don't have the time and resources available to build OOo
* etc.

== OOo_2.0_Windows_install_en-US.exe ==

This is an NSIS self-extracting installer. It contains the following
structure:

openofficeorg1.cab
openofficeorg2.cab
openofficeorg3.cab
openofficeorg4.cab
openofficeorg20.msi
instmsia.exe
instmsiw.exe
licenses/
readmes/
setup.exe
setup.ini

In the OOo 2.0 build process it is built from its contents using a command
(at "call_nsis" in solenv/bin/modules/installer/download.pm) which does
something like the following:

/cygdrive/c/Program\ Files/NSIS/makensis.exe c:/ooo2/ooo-build/build/ooo680-m3/instsetoo_native/wntmsci10.pro/OpenOffice/nsis/en-US/downloadtemplate.nsi

The file

downloadtemplate.nsi

contains instructions for building the .exe. Its directory also contains

English_pack.nsh
English_pack.nlf

which both consist of text strings in the installer language and are
referenced from downloadtemplate.nsi. (Various .ico and .bmp files, located
outside the directory, are also referenced).

== CAB files ==

These contain the actual files which get extracted. Although CAB files can
apparently store a directory tree structure, these ones are flat. The
filenames inside the CAB are often, but not always, the same as the names
when installed.

N.B. '''The order in which files are stored is very important!'''

cabextract -l # lists the contents of a cab file.
makecab.exe /F blah.ddf # Create CAB from blah.ddf, a spec+filelist

The "blah.ddf" file can be generated with a perl script like this:

<pre>
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
#
# Files to pack: c:\msi\files
# Output file path is relative to that directory
# Temporary work space: c:\msi\makecabtemp
# Usage: perl make-ddf.pl (list of names of files to pack, in order, without path)
#
print <<EOF;
.Set CabinetName1=../out.cab
.Set ReservePerCabinetSize=128
.Set MaxDiskSize=CDROM
.Set CompressionType=LZX
.Set Compress=ON
.Set CompressionLevel=2
.Set Cabinet=ON
.Set DiskDirectoryTemplate=c:/msi/makecabtemp
EOF
for my $file (@ARGV) {
print qq("c:\\msi\\files\\$file" $file\n);
}
</pre>

Some files in the CABs may not actually get installed: See Component.idt
below.

== MSI file ==

This is a relational database which controls the installation process. It
can be dumped into tab-separated text files (*.idt), one per table, using

MsiDb.Exe -e -d blah.msi -f c:\text_file_dest *

The text files can be dumped back into a new MSI like this:

MsiDb.Exe -i -d blah_new.msi -f c:\text_file_dest *.idt

(N.B. In both cases, be sure to surround the * in quotes if you're using a
UNIX shell)

If you edit these text files, you have to be pretty careful, because there
is all sorts of referrential integrity to preserve between tables. To
modify the install, some tables are particularly important:

=== File.idt ===

This is a list of files which *potentially* can be installed.

* File is the name of the file in the archive.

* Each file is part of a Component.

* FileSize speaks for itself.

* Sequence is the order in which the files appear in the CABs, and the
installer will *fail* if it is not correct. (The Sequence is across all CAB
files, so for instance the first file in CAB 3 has the Sequence number one
higher than the last file in CAB 2).

=== Directory.idt ===

Defines directories per feature component

=== Media.idt ===

Specifies the CABs from which to obtain files. Crucially, this specifies
the file number ranges contained within each CAB, so if you add any files
you will probably have to alter this.

=== Feature.idt ===

Defines Features, i.e. groupings of functionality which can be selected in
the installer.

=== FeatureComponent.idt ===

Each Feature is a set of components.

=== Component.idt ===

Specifies into which directory a component is installed (relative to Directory.idt), etc.
KeyPath is the First file in the component (in Sequence order) (?)

== Full paths of executables ==

* C:\Program Files\Microsoft Platform SDK\Bin\MsiDb.Exe
* C:\WINDOWS\system32\makecab.exe (on Windows XP)
* cabextract - UNIX (or cygwin) program

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Windows Installer Hacking