| Like any other type of project, a setup project has a set of options that govern its behavior. When the wizard created the setup project, it set many of the options; however, some of them may need tweaking. To alter or customize the setup project's options, start by selecting the project in the Solution Explorer window. The Properties window will then allow you to manage the properties that apply to the setup project. Table A.1 summarizes some of the options that you will want to be concerned with. Table A.1. Customizable Properties for the Setup Package| Property | Usage |
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| AddRemoveProgramsIcon | You can set this property to the name of a file containing an icon that will be displayed in the Add/Remove Programs dialog box in the Control Panel on the user's computer. | | Author | The name of the author of the program. | | Description | A free-text field in which you can type a description of the project. | | DetectNewerInstalledVersion | When set to True (the default), if the installer detects that a version of the program with a higher version number already exists on the target PC, the installation will not continue. | | Manufacturer | Specifies the name (typically a company name) of the manufacturer of the application. | | ProductName | The name of the application being installed. The default value is the setup project's name; you will typically want to set it to something user-friendly that describes what is being installed. For this example, I changed the ProductName property to Loan Calculator, which describes what is being installed. When the user runs the setup package, the value you set for the ProductName property will be used as the title bar of the setup wizard's screens, as well as in messages to the user. For example, if you set the ProductName property to Bob's Cool Program, the setup package will display messages like Welcome to the Bob's Cool Program Setup Wizard and The installer will install Bob's Cool Program to the following folder. | | RemovePreviousVersions | When set to True, the installer will remove previous versions of the application that it detects during installation. The default value is False. | | Title | Specifies the title of the installer package. As with the ProductName, the Title property defaults to the project name, but you can change it to something more user-friendly. |
As you will see, two of the most important properties that you will want to ensure are set correctly are the Manufacturer and ProductName properties. |