Configuring an Action for an Element in the Wizard Interface

InstallShield 2016

Project • This information applies to the following project types:

• Advanced UI
• Suite/Advanced UI

Edition • The Advanced UI project type is available in the Professional edition of InstallShield. The Suite/Advanced UI project type is available in the Premier edition of InstallShield. For information about the differences between these two project types, see Advanced UI Projects vs. Suite/Advanced UI Projects.

InstallShield lets you define actions that are launched when a wizard page or secondary window is opened or closed. This capability enables your installation to perform any initialization such as dynamically retrieving values for a combo box. It also lets you schedule actions to occur before the wizard interface is displayed at run time.

In addition, InstallShield lets you define actions that an end user triggers when using some of the various wizard interface controls. For example, you can add a Print button to a LicenseAgreement wizard page, and define a print action for that button control; when an end user clicks the Print button, the Print dialog box opens, enabling the end user to print the license agreement.

If you have actions and validation configured for a control, the validation runs before the actions. The actions run for both validation success and validation failure. They also run when the splash page is dismissed, when an image button gets or loses focus, or when an end user scrolls to the bottom of a rich text box. For more information about validation, see Configuring Validation for a Control on a Wizard Page or Window.

To configure an action for a wizard page, secondary window, or control:

1. In the View List under User Interface, click Wizard Interface.
2. In the Wizard Interface explorer, select the wizard page or secondary window that you want to modify.
3. Do one of the following if you are configuring an action for a control:
• To configure the action of one of the navigation controls (the Next, Back, Cancel, Install, or Finish buttons)—In the right pane, expand the settings for the control whose action you want to modify.
• To configure the action of any of the other controls—In the wizard editor, select the control whose action you want to modify.
4. Do one of the following:
• To schedule an action to run when the selected wizard page or window opens: In the Page Entered setting, point to the New Action button, and then click the type of action that you want to configure.
• To schedule an action to run when the selected wizard page or window closes: In the Page Exited setting, point to the New Action button, and then click the type of action that you want to configure.
• To schedule an action for a control: In the Click setting, or in an action-related setting under the Events setting, point to the New Action button, and then click the type of action that you want to configure.
5. Configure the subsettings under the action as needed.

If you enter more than one action statement, the actions are run in the order in which they are listed in the action setting.

One of the types of actions lets you call a function in a DLL file that you have created. If your project includes any DLL files in the Support Files view, InstallShield makes them available in this list, and lets you overwrite the action function name with the function in the DLL that you want to call.

The following table describes the types of actions that are available.

Control Actions

Type of Action

Description

Set Property

This type of action sets a specific property to a specific value.

Install

This type of action starts the installation and moves to a specific wizard page.

Open

This type of action opens a file or Web page.

Print

This type of action launches the Print dialog box, enabling an end user to print the specified file.

Browse for Folder

This type of action launches the Browse for Folder dialog box when an end user clicks the control.

When the end user selects a folder in this dialog box and clicks the OK button, the dialog box closes, and the installation sets the value of a specific property to the full path of the folder that the end user selected.

To configure this type of action, configure the subsettings under this action.

Browse for File

This type of action launches the file browse dialog box when an end user clicks the control.

When the end user selects a file in this dialog box and clicks the Open button, the dialog box closes, and the installation sets the value of a specific property to the full path and file name of the file that the end user selected.

To configure this type of action, configure the subsettings under this action.

Browse for New File

This type of action launches the new-file browse dialog box when an end user clicks the control. The dialog box lets the end user browse to a location where a new file should be saved.

When the end user specifies a file in this dialog box and clicks the Save button, the dialog box closes, and the installation sets the value of the property that you have specify in the Property subsetting to the full path and file name of the file that the end user specifies.

To configure this type of action, configure the subsettings under this action.

Set Active Page

This type of action moves to a specific wizard page.

Show Window

This type of action shows a secondary window as a modal window.

Close Window

This type of action closes a main wizard page or secondary window, or in some cases, provides conditional closing of a secondary window.

Close Window accepts parameters corresponding to the following predefined Return Code IDs: IDOK, IDCANCEL, IDABORT, IDRETRY, IDIGNORE, IDYES, IDNO, and IDCLOSE.

The behavior of the Close Window action differs slightly on wizard pages and secondary windows, as noted following:

• For wizard pages, the Close Window action prompts the end user to cancel if its Return Code parameter is set to IDCANCEL (and then interrupts the wizard if the end user specifies Yes). For all other Return Code IDs, the wizard immediately closes.
• For secondary windows, the Close Window action closes the secondary window and in special cases such as with the ISRMFilesInUse and ISRMFileInUse secondary windows, the specified Return Code value is returned.

InstallShield currently provides the following secondary windows that contain customized behavior that is dependent upon the specified Return Code ID:

• ISDownloadProgress
• ISPromptForSourceMedia
• ISFilesInUse
• ISRMFilesInUse
• ISUpgradeParcel
• ISSQLBrowse

Stop Event

This type of action allows you to conditionally stop further actions from being processed. For example, this action can be used to prevent the default behavior of a button from occurring.

Run a Suite Action

Project • This functionality is available in Suite/Advanced UI projects.

This type of action launches an action in the installation. The action can be any of the ones that are defined in the Events view of the Suite/Advanced UI project. For more information, see Using Actions to Extend the Behavior of a Suite/Advanced UI Installation.

Load Web Deploy Publish Profile

Project • This functionality is available in Suite/Advanced UI projects.

This type of action launches a secondary window that lets end users browse to and load a publisher profile file (.publishsettings) that contains the configuration settings that they want to use for the Web Deploy package. For more information, see Adding a Web Deploy Package to a Suite/Advanced UI Project.

Database

Project • This functionality is available in Suite/Advanced UI projects.

The following database-related options are available:

• Configure Database Metadata—Initializes the database metadata (connection string, ODBC driver, timeout value, etc.) that will be used for connecting to a database, and saves the name of the configuration in an extension DLL for other actions to reference as the active configuration.
• Override SQL Login Properties—Defines Suite properties that will be used to identify SQL login settings to establish a connection to a specified database server. For example, when the Validate a Database Login action is called, the Suite SQL runtime reads the value of the Suite properties specified by the Override SQL Login Properties action to retrieve the SQL login settings that are entered on a Suite UI wizard page and then attempts to establish a connection to the specified database server.
• Browse for Database Catalogs—Retrieves the list of available database catalogs and saves the result to a Suite property (ISSQLBrowseList). This action uses metadata and properties identified by the Configure Database Metadata and Override SQL Login Properties actions.
• Browse for Database Servers—Retrieves the list of available database servers and saves the result to a Suite property ((ISSQLBrowseList). This action uses metadata and properties identified by the Configure Database Metadata and Override SQL Login Properties actions.
• Browse for Registered Database Servers—Retrieves a list of database servers registered in ODBC DSN and saves the list to a Suite property (ISSQLBrowseLocalList). This action uses metadata and properties identified by the Configure Database Metadata and Override SQL Login Properties actions.
• Validate a Database Login—Adds a Validate action to verify the database login credentials using database metadata and properties identified by Configure Database Metadata and Override SQL Login Properties.
• Run a SQL String—Executes a SQL statement using database metadata and properties identified by Configure Database Metadata and Override SQL Login Properties.

Browse for DLL Action

This type of action calls a function in a DLL file that you have created and added to your project through the Support Files view. For example, you can use a DLL file to trigger custom behavior.

See Also

Wizard Interface View

Referring to Feature States and Other Feature Data in the UI of an Advanced UI or Suite/Advanced UI Project

InstallShield 2016 Help Library

August 2016

 Copyright Information | Flexera Software

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