On the Project page, you can specify general information about the application your setup package will install.
The information in the top part of the Project page will be shown to the user when the installation program is executed. Filling out these fields is the first thing you should do when creating a new DeployMaster package. When you have specified the name of your company and the name of the application, you will see that several other fields automatically receive a value (which you can, of course, change if you want to).
Company: The name of the company that produced the application or the brand name it is sold under. Type in your own name if this is not a company project. Leaving this field blank is permitted, but not recommended.
Company URL: URL of the web site of the company or brand specified earlier. If a URL is specified, the company name shown in the setup program will become clickable. If clicked, the user's default browser will be launched to visit the company web site.
Application name: The full name of the application the setup package will install. If you are not packaging an application but a collection of documents, type in a general title for these documents. Naming your project is mandatory. Each project must have a unique name. This name is what DeployMaster uses to determine whether the application that is about to be installed is already installed or not. If a previous install with the same application name already exists, DeployMaster will replace that installation with the new install. If you want two (major) versions of your product to co-exist side by side, you have to change the application name between releases, e.g. by indicating the (major) version number.
Application URL: Should point to the web page containing more information about this specific product. If specified, the application name will become clickable.
Application version number: Version number of the application, usually something in the form of 1.0.0. Leave blank if you do not use a meaningful version numbering scheme. The version number is displayed to the user, but is not used by the setup application itself. You can type in anything you like and that your users will understand.
Application release date: It is very important to specify an accurate release date. It should increase whenever the version number increases, and be identical when the version number is identical. The setup program uses this information to find out - in case another copy of the application has already been installed - whether the user is trying to install the same, an older or a newer version.
Icon: Icon that identifies the application. Since applications are identified by their icons throughout the Windows operating system, it is a good idea to present it to the user at the first opportunity: the installation program. You can select a .ico file or a .exe file. DeployMaster will extract the 32x32 size icon from the file and put just that icon into the setup.exe.
Then you can specify which file should be used as the Readme document. This document should contain any information that might be useful for the user before he installs the application. It should also contain a quick overview of what the setup package will actually install, so the user can make a good decision whether he wants to go through with the installation or not. Click on the Readme button to locate the appropriate file with an open file common dialog.
If you have specified a readme file, the setup program will present a button to the user labeled "More Information". When clicked, the document will be extracted from the compressed setup archive into a temporary folder and displayed. It is recommended to specify a .txt or .rtf file. These files are displayed inside the installation program. If you specify another type of file, the file will be shown to the user by extracting it into a temporary folder and running the default program to open it. If you know your users' computers support them, you can use .html, .chm or .pdf files. Using a .txt or .rtf file has the advantage that you can be 100% sure the user will be able to properly read the readme file. The other file types, certainly PDF, allow you to create a much nicer readme document to further improve the first impression.
Also, DeployMaster offers to show the readme file before the installation process starts, and not when it is finished, at which point installation tips and system requirements are no longer of any use. You will probably also want to add the readme file to the application's main component on the Files page, so the user can read it again later.
The license agreement, on the other hand, must be a plain text or a .rtf file. This is because it will be shown inside the DeployMaster installer, so the user cannot bypass it. As not to bloat the installer, only plain text files and basic .rtf files are supported. Basic means whatever you can create in the WordPad applet that comes with Windows. The WordPad viewer (the RichEdit common control) is embedded in Windows and can be easily accessed by applications such as DeployMaster. The license agreement is shown when the user clicks the Install button. When the user clicks Yes to accept the agreement, the installation will continue. If the user clicks No, the installation will be aborted.
You will probably also want to add the license agreement file to the application's main component on the Files page, so the user can read it again later. Not specifying any license agreement is perfectly okay for DeployMaster, though your lawyer may have a different opinion.
Providing a Support DLL is optional. You can use a support DLL to add functionality to your installer that DeployMaster does not provide. The sample Support DLL source code includes comments that explain what you can do with a Support DLL.
Default Application Folder is the folder that will be represented by %APPFOLDER% in the Files tab. The user has the option of changing this folder if he clicks on the Advanced Options button in the setup program. Likewise, Default Common Files Folder is the default for %APPCOMMONFOLDER%, Default Start Menu Folder is the default for %APPMENU%, and Default User Data Folder is the default for %USERDATA%. See the standard folder names topic for more information. If you are not installing any files into one of these folders, you can leave the default setting for that folder blank. In that case, the Advanced Options section of the setup program will not allow the user to configure this folder (which would be pointless, since you are not using that folder).