Can anyone share some information about the process of making a complete installer for cracked plugins?
Is there a way to re-pack an installed plugin with my preferences to a new installer bundle like we get in the CE installers?
(For PC)

Thanks!

 

First you gotta learn Russian and make it impossible to read so all you have to do is pray you are hitting the next button....

 

@r4e

 

Thats a quite complex subject.

First you have to learn how to create a basic installer using Inno Setup.
It has several sections for several purposes. There's one for the registry, one for the files, one for basic setup
informations and its config, one for language settings, another one for custom texts and a code section for
custom functions and stuff.

In a basic installer, you can leave out the code section and just use the other ones.
There are also some helpers to automate the process of creating such an installer.
The best one for beginners should be Inno Script Studio but I just use a simple text editor (Notepad2-Mod)
so I don't know much about the alternatives.

What I do to create such a package:
I use a virtual machine with a fresh windows to install, monitor and analyze the product I want to repack.
For monitoring I mostly use VMware ThinApp or simply Sandboxie. ThinApp is used to virtualize programs
(make them portable) and it captures every change that's made to the system incl. the registry, folder structures, etc.
Sandboxie only can capture the file & folder structures but you also can run regedit sandboxed to seek for any changes there
but in a lot cases the files are enough. There are also tools like Regshot to dump the registry changes before and after
if you don't want to use ThinApp.

After analyzing, I copy everything into a folder and create subfolders (if needed) for the App itself (program files),
Appdata, Documents, Common files, etc. based on the results of the monitoring and I export all the registry data
into *.reg files, which I then convert into Inno Script language using RegExporter.
There's also the hard way to just type all the reg entries into inno script but I'm freakin lazy so I use that tool.

And when I've done that, I start to write the installer script (you could start to use Inno Script Studio).

Over the years I created more and more installers so I already have my own library of script templates, plugins, skins,
code snippets, and more and when I create a new project, I just take one of my previous installer scripts as a template,
if it fits the new project as well.

When I'm almost done, I compile the installer and if everything worked, I again run the virtual machine to test it.
In fact I run several virtual machines with several OS versions to test for compatibility.

In case of a VST installer, you definitely have to gain a little knowledge about the code section (Pascal script) because you don't just
have one main app path but several paths for the vst plugins, presets, etc. and if you want to provide flexibility,
you should add some custom wizard pages for these paths. I for myself coded 1 page that contains all the paths + browse buttons
but you also can do it like VR or R2R (to create a page for each path). But if you're fine with a one click installer,
you can leave that out and just set the paths as you want (withour a choice to change them while installing).

The code section also allows you to mod the installer metrics (make it bigger), rework the layout, add skins (using ISSkin),
use inno plugins to integrate music, pictures, external compression, fancy looking effects, a splash screen, etc.
or to completely write your own installer with custom layout, buttons and other things.
But that comes with the experience you gain. There are a lot of forums and other places to learn.

 

Fun fact: I learned the most on russian inno setup forums without speaking a single word in that language.
Google translator was my friend. I even translated some useful tools from russian coders using resource/hex editors
to integrate them into my workflow and I tried to learn from russian inno scripts (by translating them first)
from russian repack template sites (game installers for example). In some cases I worked on such installer scripts
for hours or days just to extract that one function I was looking for.

For example a fuction to get a transparency effect on the setup window. For that line of code I reversed the script
until just the wizard form and that effect was left over and then I tried to understand the code to be able to add it
to my own script. Before I knew about that possibility, I used to run NirCMD external from the temp dir to add a
transparency effect by extracting and running it with respective parameters from the code section (stupid solution).

You could call that learning by doing. Wasn't familiar with coding at all before I started working with Inno Setup
and I just did it because of the same reason as the one who started this topic.

 

WOW!!!! Thanks for sharing all of this!

 

So it's easy then. You just have to be a genius!

 

Blazin
All non english Vr installers made on Ukrainian ) ....not russian ....
Guy behind Team vr is a big patriot)))

 

He is right, most of the time, the file & folder structures of sandboxie is enough!

To get in to the RegHive of sandboxie, and to convert the Hive in to a regedit file without running a sandbox is easy with this freeware tool*

*https://www.mitec.cz/wrr.html (It's Portable, maybe check out the other Forensic tools he offers)

And thanks for the explanation of your process!!!

 

Thanks for that one, extremely helpful!

 

So great @r4e

I do much simpler things, no installers.
But FWIW the process of recording the changes both in files and registry is a piece of cake with the program "Total Uninstaller" in monitoring mode. With 4 clicks after the installation and you get all the added/modified files in a .zip file mirroring the file system (folder C/Program files/ and so on) and a Install.reg and Uninstall.reg with all the registry changes.

Of course virtualization methods are superior and safer. But unless there's drivers involved or very low-level changes the only plugin/DAW/Kontakt/Standalone plugin version I've been unable to convert to no install is Helix Native.

Something pretty unique about permissions probably, that'd require advanced SetAcl tools or something like that.

PS. Of course "Total Uninstaller" creator is Russian or perhaps Ukranian ;)

 

Well, I can manage to put my own pants on...

you guys are waaay beyond me

 

BTW huge installer for fresh os warriors
check out
TeamOS VIP Installer v1 -=- M4Mohsin -=-

 

Great site (talking about their forum). When I don't find advanced system tools I go there.
And if memory serves one of the best no-official Windows releases teams ({Gen2}) is composed of Team-OS and another one members.

 

speak english dude! lol :D

 

Btw that monitoring isn't everything and it also isn't the best method in some cases.
Sometimes programs create their structures and keys on first start or using parameters while getting
installed. FL Studio is one of them but also tools from Stardock and other dev's. I once tried to recreate an installer
for Stardock Fences and I got a hell of a list of reg entries that only worked on my particular system config.

Therefore I also use tools from Sysinternals like Process Explorer (the "better" task manager) and Process Monitor
to see what a process does and what parameters get called. In the end my inno script just had to place the files
and run 4 command line parameters to install Fences successfully on every system.

When repacking microsoft installers (*.msi), I sometimes don't even install and monitor them,
I instead simply unpack them using this comnmand line from my context menu:

Code:

msiexec /a "%1" /qb targetdir="%1_UNP"

"%1" = the name of the msi installer file

You can add that to the context menu by importing this regfile to your registry: MSI Extract.7z

Just extract to C:\ProgramData\Tweaks or to any other dir (change the path in the reg file then)
and double click it (import the regfile). Included a batch script to create and open that "Tweaks" folder.



after extraction you'll have a subfolder with the ending "_UNP" and inside you'll find all the files
+ a mini *.msi installer copy of your extracted package, which you can analyze using Less MSIérables



You now can create your inno script or even simpler, just add your cracked files to the folder structures
and install the program using that extracted mini msi file (R2R uses that method on their Ableton releases).

 

Last edited: Aug 10, 2020

Hahah That is so simple.

......

Wait ..
I suppose you mean with the zipper in the front.
I'll get back to you.

 

If you need some more little context menu helpers, here you go:
Hidden Files OnOff.7z
Test_x86_x64.7z

Hidden Files OnOff - lets you show or hide hidden files with a simple click
-->

Test x86 x64 - lets you test if a binary file (dll or exe) was made for the 32Bit or 64Bit architecture
-->

 

Why Team V.R installers can not be opened with InnoExtractor, and R2R can? Is there any other program to do the extraction?

 

Yep, that's what I meant when talking about drivers/low-level stuff.
Plugins are relatively easy because the low-level part is handled by the DAW. Some DAWs are easy too because are closs-platform, but not all of them. I tried to do a no-install of StartIsBack and still have nightmares...

You playful bastard...
Estic parlant un anglès perfecte.
It's also true that I tried that line in Google translate to Spanish and a notification showed up: "Drink with moderation dude. Sincerely, the Google translate staff"