CPack WIX Generator

Use the WiX Toolset to produce a Windows Installer .msi database.

New in version 3.7: The CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_DISABLED variable is now supported.

WiX Toolsets

CPack selects one of the following variants of the WiX Toolset based on the CPACK_WIX_VERSION variable:

WiX .NET Tools

Packaging is performed using the following tools:

wix build

Build WiX source files directly into a Windows Installer .msi database.

Invocations may be customized using tool-specific variables:

WiX extensions must be named with the form WixToolset.<Name>.wixext.

CPack expects the wix .NET tool to be available for command-line use with any required WiX extensions already installed. Be sure the wix version is compatible with CPACK_WIX_VERSION, and that WiX extension versions match the wix tool version. For example:

  1. Install the wix command-line tool using dotnet.

To install wix globally for the current user:

dotnet tool install --global wix --version 4.0.4

This places wix.exe in %USERPROFILE%\.dotnet\tools and adds the directory to the current user's PATH environment variable.

Or, to install wix in a specific path, e.g., in c:\WiX:

dotnet tool install --tool-path c:\WiX wix --version 4.0.4

This places wix.exe in c:\WiX, but does not add it to the current user's PATH environment variable. The WIX environment variable may be set to tell CPack where to find the tool, e.g., set WIX=c:\WiX.

  1. Add the WiX UI extension, needed by CPack's default WiX template:

wix extension add --global WixToolset.UI.wixext/4.0.4

Extensions added globally are stored in %USERPROFILE%\.wix, or if the WIX_EXTENSIONS environment variable is set, in %WIX_EXTENSIONS%\.wix.

WiX Toolset v3

Packaging is performed using the following tools:

candle

Compiles WiX source files into .wixobj files.

Invocations may be customized using tool-specific variables:

light

Links .wixobj files into a Windows Installer .msi database.

Invocations may be customized using tool-specific variables:

CPack invokes both tools as needed. Intermediate .wixobj files are considered implementation details.

WiX extensions must be named with the form Wix<Name>Extension.

CPack expects the above tools to be available for command-line use via the PATH. Or, if the WIX environment variable is set, CPack looks for the tools in %WIX% and %WIX%\bin.

Variables specific to CPack WIX generator

The following variables are specific to the installers built on Windows using WiX.

CPACK_WIX_VERSION

New in version 3.30.

Specify the version of WiX Toolset for which the configuration is written. The value must be one of

4

Package using WiX .NET Tools.

3

Package using WiX Toolset v3. This is the default.

CPACK_WIX_UPGRADE_GUID

Upgrade GUID (Product/@UpgradeCode)

Will be automatically generated unless explicitly provided.

It should be explicitly set to a constant generated globally unique identifier (GUID) to allow your installers to replace existing installations that use the same GUID.

You may for example explicitly set this variable in your CMakeLists.txt to the value that has been generated per default. You should not use GUIDs that you did not generate yourself or which may belong to other projects.

A GUID shall have the following fixed length syntax:

XXXXXXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXXXXXXXXXX

(each X represents an uppercase hexadecimal digit)

CPACK_WIX_PRODUCT_GUID

Product GUID (Product/@Id)

Will be automatically generated unless explicitly provided.

If explicitly provided this will set the Product Id of your installer.

The installer will abort if it detects a pre-existing installation that uses the same GUID.

The GUID shall use the syntax described for CPACK_WIX_UPGRADE_GUID.

CPACK_WIX_LICENSE_RTF

RTF License File

If CPACK_RESOURCE_FILE_LICENSE has an .rtf extension it is used as-is.

If CPACK_RESOURCE_FILE_LICENSE has an .txt extension it is implicitly converted to RTF by the WIX Generator. The expected encoding of the .txt file is UTF-8.

With CPACK_WIX_LICENSE_RTF you can override the license file used by the WIX Generator in case CPACK_RESOURCE_FILE_LICENSE is in an unsupported format or the .txt -> .rtf conversion does not work as expected.

CPACK_WIX_PRODUCT_ICON

The Icon shown next to the program name in Add/Remove programs.

If set, this icon is used in place of the default icon.

CPACK_WIX_UI_REF

Specify the WiX UI extension's dialog set:

  • With WiX .NET Tools, this is the Id of the <ui:WixUI> element in the default WiX template.

  • With WiX Toolset v3, this is the Id of the <UIRef> element in the default WiX template.

The default is WixUI_InstallDir in case no CPack components have been defined and WixUI_FeatureTree otherwise.

CPACK_WIX_UI_BANNER

The bitmap will appear at the top of all installer pages other than the welcome and completion dialogs.

If set, this image will replace the default banner image.

This image must be 493 by 58 pixels.

CPACK_WIX_UI_DIALOG

Background bitmap used on the welcome and completion dialogs.

If this variable is set, the installer will replace the default dialog image.

This image must be 493 by 312 pixels.

CPACK_WIX_PROGRAM_MENU_FOLDER

Start menu folder name for launcher.

If this variable is not set, it will be initialized with CPACK_PACKAGE_NAME

New in version 3.16: If this variable is set to ., then application shortcuts will be created directly in the start menu and the uninstaller shortcut will be omitted.

CPACK_WIX_CULTURES

Language(s) of the installer

Languages are compiled into the Wix UI extension library. To use them, simply provide the name of the culture. If you specify more than one culture identifier in a comma or semicolon delimited list, the first one that is found will be used. You can find a list of supported languages at: https://wixtoolset.org/docs/v3/wixui/wixui_localization/

CPACK_WIX_TEMPLATE

Template file for WiX generation

If this variable is set, the specified template will be used to generate the WiX wxs file. This should be used if further customization of the output is required. The template contents will override the effect of most CPACK_WIX_ variables.

If this variable is not set, the default MSI template included with CMake will be used.

CPACK_WIX_PATCH_FILE

Optional list of XML files with fragments to be inserted into generated WiX sources.

New in version 3.5: Support listing multiple patch files.

This optional variable can be used to specify an XML file that the WIX generator will use to inject fragments into its generated source files.

Patch files understood by the CPack WIX generator roughly follow this RELAX NG compact schema:

start = CPackWiXPatch

CPackWiXPatch = element CPackWiXPatch { CPackWiXFragment* }

CPackWiXFragment = element CPackWiXFragment
{
    attribute Id { string },
    fragmentContent*
}

fragmentContent = element * - CPackWiXFragment
{
    (attribute * { text } | text | fragmentContent)*
}

Currently fragments can be injected into most Component, File, Directory and Feature elements.

New in version 3.3: The following additional special Ids can be used:

  • #PRODUCT for the <Product> element.

  • #PRODUCTFEATURE for the root <Feature> element.

New in version 3.7: Support patching arbitrary <Feature> elements.

New in version 3.9: Allow setting additional attributes.

The following example illustrates how this works.

Given that the WIX generator creates the following XML element:

<Component Id="CM_CP_applications.bin.my_libapp.exe" Guid="*"/>

The following XML patch file may be used to inject an Environment element into it:

<CPackWiXPatch>
  <CPackWiXFragment Id="CM_CP_applications.bin.my_libapp.exe">
    <Environment Id="MyEnvironment" Action="set"
      Name="MyVariableName" Value="MyVariableValue"/>
  </CPackWiXFragment>
</CPackWiXPatch>
CPACK_WIX_EXTRA_SOURCES

Extra WiX source files

This variable provides an optional list of extra WiX source files (.wxs) that should be compiled and linked. The paths must be absolute.

CPACK_WIX_EXTRA_OBJECTS

Extra WiX object files or libraries to use with WiX Toolset v3.

This variable provides an optional list of extra WiX object (.wixobj) and/or WiX library (.wixlib) files. The paths must be absolute.

CPACK_WIX_EXTENSIONS

Specify a list of additional extensions for WiX tools. See WiX Toolsets for extension naming patterns.

CPACK_WIX_<TOOL>_EXTENSIONS

Specify a list of additional extensions for a specific WiX tool. See WiX Toolsets for possible <TOOL> names.

CPACK_WIX_<TOOL>_EXTRA_FLAGS

Specify a list of additional command-line flags for a specific WiX tool. See WiX Toolsets for possible <TOOL> names.

Use it at your own risk. Future versions of CPack may generate flags which may be in conflict with your own flags.

CPACK_WIX_CMAKE_PACKAGE_REGISTRY

If this variable is set the generated installer will create an entry in the windows registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Kitware\CMake\Packages\<PackageName> The value for <PackageName> is provided by this variable.

Assuming you also install a CMake configuration file this will allow other CMake projects to find your package with the find_package() command.

CPACK_WIX_PROPERTY_<PROPERTY>

New in version 3.1.

This variable can be used to provide a value for the Windows Installer property <PROPERTY>

The following list contains some example properties that can be used to customize information under "Programs and Features" (also known as "Add or Remove Programs")

  • ARPCOMMENTS - Comments

  • ARPHELPLINK - Help and support information URL

  • ARPURLINFOABOUT - General information URL

  • ARPURLUPDATEINFO - Update information URL

  • ARPHELPTELEPHONE - Help and support telephone number

  • ARPSIZE - Size (in kilobytes) of the application

CPACK_WIX_ROOT_FEATURE_TITLE

New in version 3.7.

Sets the name of the root install feature in the WIX installer. Same as CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_DISPLAY_NAME for components.

CPACK_WIX_ROOT_FEATURE_DESCRIPTION

New in version 3.7.

Sets the description of the root install feature in the WIX installer. Same as CPACK_COMPONENT_<compName>_DESCRIPTION for components.

CPACK_WIX_SKIP_PROGRAM_FOLDER

New in version 3.7.

If this variable is set to true, the default install location of the generated package will be CPACK_PACKAGE_INSTALL_DIRECTORY directly. The install location will not be located relatively below ProgramFiles or ProgramFiles64.

Note

Installers created with this feature do not take differences between the system on which the installer is created and the system on which the installer might be used into account.

It is therefore possible that the installer e.g. might try to install onto a drive that is unavailable or unintended or a path that does not follow the localization or convention of the system on which the installation is performed.

CPACK_WIX_ROOT_FOLDER_ID

New in version 3.9.

This variable allows specification of a custom root folder ID. The generator specific <64> token can be used for folder IDs that come in 32-bit and 64-bit variants. In 32-bit builds the token will expand empty while in 64-bit builds it will expand to 64.

When unset generated installers will default installing to ProgramFiles<64>Folder.

CPACK_WIX_ROOT

This variable can optionally be set to the root directory of a custom WiX Toolset installation.

When unspecified CPack will try to locate a WiX Toolset installation via the WIX environment variable instead.

CPACK_WIX_CUSTOM_XMLNS

New in version 3.19.

This variable provides a list of custom namespace declarations that are necessary for using WiX extensions. Each declaration should be in the form name=url, where name is the plain namespace without the usual xmlns: prefix and url is an unquoted namespace url. A list of commonly known WiX schemata can be found here: https://wixtoolset.org/docs/v3/xsd/

CPACK_WIX_SKIP_WIX_UI_EXTENSION

New in version 3.23.

If this variable is set to true, the default inclusion of the WiX UI extension is skipped, i.e., the -ext WixUIExtension or -ext WixToolset.UI.wixext flag is not passed to WiX tools.

CPACK_WIX_ARCHITECTURE

New in version 3.24.

This variable can be optionally set to specify the target architecture of the installer. May for example be set to x64 or arm64.

When unspecified, CPack will default to x64 or x86.

CPACK_WIX_INSTALL_SCOPE

New in version 3.29.

This variable can be optionally set to specify the InstallScope of the installer:

perMachine

Create an installer that installs for all users and requires administrative privileges. Start menu entries created by the installer are visible to all users.

This is the default if CPACK_WIX_VERSION is set to any value other than 3.

perUser

Not yet supported. This is reserved for future use.

NONE

Create an installer without any InstallScope attribute.

If CPACK_WIX_VERSION is not set, or is set to 3, this value is the default to preserve compatibility with 3.28 and lower. Otherwise, this value is not supported.

Deprecated since version 3.29: This value is only for compatibility with the inconsistent behavior used by CPack 3.28 and older. The resulting installer requires administrative privileges and installs into the system-wide ProgramFiles directory, but the start menu entry and uninstaller registration are created only for the current user.

Warning

An installation performed by an installer created without any InstallScope cannot be cleanly updated or replaced by an installer with an InstallScope. In order to transition a project's installers from NONE to perMachine, the latter installer should be distributed with instructions to first manually uninstall any older version.

See https://wixtoolset.org/docs/v3/xsd/wix/package/