Creating Components and File Links

InstallShield 2025 » Basic MSI Tutorial

You can add links to additional files in the Files and Folders view. In this step, you will add a file to your Help_Files feature. As you add files in the Files and Folders view, the IDE creates components for you according to Setup Best Practices rules.

To add Tutorial.html to a new component in the Help_Files feature:

Open the Files and Folders view.

In the Destination computer’s folders pane, right-click the Destination Computer icon and verify that Show Components is selected.

Select Help_Files from the feature list at the top of the view.

Expand the tree in the Destination computer’s folders pane to see the [INSTALLDIR] folder.

Right-click the [INSTALLDIR] folder and select New Component. Name the component Help_Component.

In the Source computer’s folders pane, browse for the Tutorial files source folder containing TutorialHelp.html.

Drag the TutorialHelp.html icon from the Source computer’s files pane to the Help_Component component in the Destination computer’s folders. InstallShield adds the file to Help_Component component in the Help_Files feature.

Click the Help_Component icon to display the component’s files in the Destination computer’s files pane.

Because each component should have a key file, right-click the TutorialHelp.html file and select Set Key File.

This type of file linking, where the list of files linked to a component does not change, is called static file linking. To link to a directory (and possibly its subdirectories) whose contents might change between builds, see Dynamic File Linking.

The next step of the tutorial explains how to build a release image for your installation project.