How to expose methods from a C# assembly which can be consumed as custom actions in Visual Studio In-CodePudding

I am using the Visual Studio Installer Projects extension for Visual Studio 2019. I have created my setup project and want to add custom actions which I want to implement as C# methods (I want the methods to install/uninstall a certificate). What I am not clear on is the linkage between the custom action configuration in the Custom Actions panel (appearing in Visual Studio) and the C# code I want to invoke. How do I create the class/methods such that they will be visible to the installer and activated as required? Does the class have to have a certain inheritance, and if so, what assemblies are required?

CodePudding user response：

You can create them just like you would a normal class. You will need to import a couple of namespaces to do it.

Specifically

Microsoft.Deployment.WindowsInstaller;
Microsoft.Tools.WindowsInstallerXml;

Here is a shortened version of a custom action I did for an installer a little while back.

using Microsoft.Deployment.WindowsInstaller;
using Microsoft.Tools.WindowsInstallerXml;

public class CustomActions : WixExtension
{

[CustomAction]
public static ActionResult CreateAndPopulateStorageFolder(Session session)
{
      ActionResult result = ActionResult.Success;
      try
      {
          session.Log("In Custom Action: CreateAndPopulateStorageFolder");
          if (!Directory.Exists("C:\\Path"))
          {
               session.Log("In Custom Action: CreateAndPopulateStorageFolder: Directory does not exist");
               Directory.CreateDirectory("C:\\Path");
               Directory.CreateDirectory("C:\\Path");
               Directory.CreateDirectory("C:\\Path");
          }
      }
      catch (Exception ex)
      {
          session.Log(ex.Message);
          result = ActionResult.Failure;
      }
      return result;
}

}

CodePudding user response：

I found the answer in this article. Basically amounts to adding an Installer class to my assembly (inherits from System.Configuration.Install.Installer) and overriding the appropriate methods. Need to set the InstallerClass property to True for the Custom Action Properties.

using System.Collections;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Configuration.Install;
using System.IO;

namespace InstallerCustomAction
{
    [RunInstaller(true)]
    public partial class MyInstaller : Installer
    {
        public MyInstaller()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
        }

        public override void Install(IDictionary stateSaver)
        {
            File.WriteAllText(@"C:\InstallTest.txt", "This is a test of an install action");
            base.Install(stateSaver);
        }
    }
}

(Note that the template creates a corresponding Designer.cs file)

This doesn't seem to support incoming parameters, but it's not something I need.