How to Package your Desktop App yourself (i.e. not use the cloud)
There were some old discussions on how to package your desktop app yourself in case the cloud is down or you can't use the cloud due to company policies or whatever. The documentation for doing this is lacking so here's how you do it in Windows - maybe it will save somebody else a few hours…Anyway, here's how you do it and what you need to install as a prerequisite…
- You're running Windows XP Pro – may work with Vista or 7, but I haven't tested
- You have Titanium Desktop Installed in the default location
- ImageMagick (Recommend the Windows Q16 Static Binary Build) which will resize and setup your application images.
- “ReplaceVistaIcon.exe” that comes with some Microsoft SDK's….alternatively you can use this version that seems to be open source…
- Visual C++ 2008 Runtime Redistributable Package
- WiX Installer v3 which takes an xml file and generates a windows installation package (hit okay if it warns you about not having Visual Studio - you don't need Votive to build your app…)
- You need to know the shortened versions of your paths (use dir /x in command prompt)
- Assets Directory – normally located in “C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Titanium\sdk\win32\1.0.0\” which would translate to “C:\Docume~1\AllUse~1\Applic~1\Titanium\sdk\win32\1.0.0\”
- Dist Files Directory – normally located in “C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Titanium\” which would translate to “C:\Docume~1\AllUse~1\Applic~1\Titanium\”
- Your Application's Directory – for this example, my app is located in “C:\projects\testapp\”
- Then simply create this batch file (I call it build.bat), replacing directories as applicable. You can also replace "bundle" with "network" if you want the installer to download Titanium SDK from the network at install time:
@ECHO OFF C: CD\projects\testapp C:\DOCUME~1\AllUse~1\Applic~1\Titanium\sdk\win32\1.0.0\tibuild.py -d dist -s C:\Docume~1\AllUse~1\Applic~1\Titanium -a C:\Docume~1\AllUse~1\Applic~1\Titanium\sdk\win32\1.0.0 -t bundle . CD dist DIR PAUSE - You'll then have a testapp.msi file in the “dist” folder of your application. Copy this to whatever machine you want to install your app on and run it.
Happy building and maybe someone at Appcelerator can get this linked to the existing doc on how to package an app for Desktop… :)
-rob
2 Answers
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Glad to hear I'm not the only one having to do this. Here's my local_build_win32.bat:
@echo off REM Dependencies: REM WiX v3 REM http://wix.sourceforge.net/releases/3.0.5419.0/Wix3.msi REM .NET Framework Version 2 REM http://download.microsoft.com/download/5/6/7/567758a3-759e-473e-bf8f-52154438565a/dotnetfx.exe REM http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0856EACB-4362-4B0D-8EDD-AAB15C5E04F5&displaylang=en REM Imagick's convert.exe REM http://www.imagemagick.org/script/binary-releases.php#windows REM ReplaceVistaIcon.exe REM http://www.rw-designer.com/compile-vista-icon REM REM Usage: local_build_win32.bat [app source path] [build destination path] set TSRC="c:\docume~1\alluse~1\applic~1\titanium" set TSDK=%TSRC%\sdk\win32\1.0.0 set PYTHON_DIR=%TSRC%\modules\win32\python\1.0.0 %PYTHON_DIR%\python.exe %TSDK%\tibuild.py -a %TSDK% -t bundle -d %2 -s %TSRC% %1Also note that you can change how the *.msi package is built (e.g. alter the start menu items or default installation path) by editing
installer_template.wxsin the win32 sdk directory. -
Since the .bat wasn't working, I made some research, found a post written by Nicholas K. Dionysopoulos, made some modifications on the .bat submitted by Andris and it worked:
@echo off REM Dependencies: REM WiX v3 REM http://wix.sourceforge.net/downloadv3.html REM Visual C++ 2008 Runtime Redistributable Package REM http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=29 REM .NET Framework Version 2 REM http://download.microsoft.com/download/5/6/7/567758a3-759e-473e-bf8f-52154438565a/dotnetfx.exe REM http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0856EACB-4362-4B0D-8EDD-AAB15C5E04F5&displaylang=en REM Imagicks convert.exe REM http://www.imagemagick.org/script/binary-releases.php#windows REM ReplaceVistaIcon.exe REM http://www.rw-designer.com/compile-vista-icon REM REM Usage: local_build_win32.bat [app source path] set TSRC="C:\Users\...(your user account)...\AppData\Roaming\Titanium" set TSDK=%TSRC%\sdk\win32\1.2.0.RC4 set PYTHON_DIR=%TSRC%\modules\win32\python\1.2.0.RC4 set DESTINATION=%1\dist\win32 %PYTHON_DIR%\python.exe %TSDK%\tibuild.py -o win32 -t bundle -s %TSRC% -a %TSDK% -d %DESTINATION% -p test.exe %1It's very important to install the version 3 of WiX, don't install v 3.5 or newer versions. It didn't work for me. Also is good to read Nicholas post to understand the tibuild -p parameter modification.
Be sure the [app source path]\dist\win32 folder is already created before running the .bat