IDEA: Small roll out exe script.

[deltaend]

This would be a very small but graphical program that would take a collective of files and batch install them on a system.  For example, I want to install 3 small programs (RealVNC, Microsoft Anti-Spyware Beta, StartupCPL) all in a row over and over and over again.  To avoid having to babysit this process I would like to get a small program can take a couple of programs, script out what options are always going to be selected, wait till the window idles, and then gives the next command to the window to continue.  If the program encountered a window it didn't recognize it would stop and ask you for input before skipping this install alltogether and starting the next one.  Once the first install is done, it would process the next install program with the pre-scripted input.  At the end of ALL the installs it would ask you if you wanted to delete the temporary extracted files and the original exe file as well.  If you didn't hit anything for 30 seconds it would automatically self delete the extracted files and itself.  Hopefully this program would be easy to graphically re-script over and over again as new programs come out and are included in this package.  Probably the best would be if it also contained some sort of SFX compression to it or at least used with WinRAR.

[mouser]

i think there are programs that do this, made for sys admins, but i don't really know the field.  maybe someone can enlighten us..

Prism Deploy comes to mind, but i don't have any experience with it.

[Dragonrider]

Ahhh...  Something I can expound on.  I don't ever do that do I? 

This whole scenerio depends on what your trying to do, how automated you want it to be, how automated the programs you want to install can be, & how much work & time you want to invest in the project.

Everything you've asked for, & lots more can be done by doing some scripting.  Even the scripting can be kept to a minimum with some extra tools (i.e. autoscriptwriter).  The way I've been doing this kind of automation for the last 5-8 years is by using a scripting language called AutoIt.  It is specifically written to do exactly what your asking.  Anything it can't do (like dealing with compressed files) can be done by invoking other programs to handle the problem.  There are numerous people on the AutoIt Yahoo! group who have used AutoIt to install MANY programs on 1000's of PCs (each having different requirements & programs) on LANs & WANs.

AutoIt started out as a very simple language that could do some pretty complicated things.  Its newest version (3.1.1.?) can do VERY SOPHISTICATED things with VERY COMPLICATED GUI's.  The beta program I wrote for donationcoder.com called WinFocus is written in AutoIt v3 (yeah I'm still working on it, honest...).  AutoIt can even do all of the things "deltaend" asked for in his "IDEA: Annoying Toy" post which has nothing to do with automation, but AutoIt is sophisticated enough to even do very complicated GUI manipulations of any programs on the screen.

Best of all?  It's FREE!

If your interested, go over to http://www.hiddensoft.com & go to the version 3 section (on left of screen).  You can also join their forums that are very active with not only users, but the creator of autoit (Jonathan Bennett), & many of the developers who are helping him now.  The developers are also users of the language & are very open to suggestions & tend to fix bugs very quickly.

HTH

Regards
Dragonrider