Should you still use a clean machine for application repackaging under Windows 7?
I would like some opinions whether or not it's still considered "best practice' to capture (via Wise or Installshield) on a clean machine under Windows 7 or... Would you install core apps like Office 2010 and Acrobat reader on this "clean machine".
What are your experiances with either one and a few reasons why you chose one over the other.
Thanks
Answers (5)
I agree with the other commenters. I try to keep my packaging VMs as clean as is practical. If I am packaging something like a Java application, I'll add a JRE to the snapshot before packaging the application, then delete that snapshot when I am finished. You want to be sure you can capture every change the installer makes, and not have to wade through a bunch of unrelated changes made by other software running on the machine. A clean machine is one of the best ways to do that. It will save you time and trouble in the long run.
I would still use a clean image, and install any prerequisite software on an as-needed basis when required by the application you package.
clean the machine before you take capture is a good practice. otherwise you have to waste your time to remove those junk entries..
its a good practice to clean the machine before taking capture otherwise a lot of junk entries will be captured
You want to see every change that the install makes, right? Why take the risk of preinstalled software preventing a ciritical application component from being installed? Make the assumption that you need to know exactly what is being installed on the machine - you can always remove it later if need be. Ask yourself this question: will I always be installing those versions of Office and Acrobat and never patching or updating them? If you will never update/patch, get out of that environment while you can. Otherwise, make the assumption that those apps will not always be there in that state.
