Summary

This article describes the process to pass multiple command line parameters to an MSI with a Setup wrapper

Synopsis

This article describes the process to pass multiple command line parameters to an MSI with a Setup wrapper. Typically, if a parameter requires quotes to specify a path for instance, if there is more than a single instance within a /v parameter, part of the parameter will not be processed successfully.

Discussion

It appears that if an MSI property is passed, it must be the last parameter listed within the /v arguments and there cannot be more than one instance of property within a single /v call. Please see below for examples.

The following is a simple argument where only one property is being passed. This works as expected:

setup.exe /V"INSTALLDIR=\"C:\Program Files\Test\\""

However, the following will fail:

setup.exe /V"INSTALLDIR=\"C:\Program Files\Test\\" /l*v %TEMP%\log.log"

This, however, will succeed because the property argument is at the end:

setup.exe /V"/l*v %TEMP%\log.log INSTALLDIR=\"C:\Program Files\Test\\""

This will also fail because there is a second property (hence, one of the properties is not the last argument):

setup.exe /V"/l*v %TEMP%\log.log INSTALLDIR=\"C:\Program Files\Test\\" LOGDIR="C:\log files\\""

Workaround

In this case, what you can do is to specify additional properties within its own /v parameter. For instance, for the last case above, you can specify the following:

setup.exe /V"/l*v %TEMP%\log.log INSTALLDIR=\"C:\Program Files\Test\\"" /V"LOGDIR=\"C:\log files\\""