How to declare virtual path in .wxs file?

Question

I am quite new in creating setup project using .wxs file.I am using WIX 3.9. I want to change the physical path to virtual path in .wxs file. Currently .wsx file is using physical path like this -

<Component Id="cmp2CB74B07C01493F593A258BAE09C0B1C" Guid="08CD4620-DE67-4C7A-A97A-212AB5BA5E52">
  <File Id="filCF6108D60D7B1865907043E2ABFE30DF" KeyPath="yes" Source="C:\ProjectName\Client\Bin\AjaxControlToolkit.dll" />
</Component>

I want to use virtual path something like this -

  <Component Id="cmp2CB74B07C01493F593A258BAE09C0B1C" Guid="08CD4620-DE67-4C7A-A97A-212AB5BA5E52">
    <File Id="filCF6108D60D7B1865907043E2ABFE30DF" KeyPath="yes" Source="~\ProjectName\Client\Bin\AjaxControlToolkit.dll" />
    </Component>

How could I do this in .wxs file? Please suggest.

Answer 1

Assuming you are already using heat to generate your components, you can specify a variable by using -var <VariableName>. According to the docs this will:

Substitute File/@Source="SourceDir" with a preprocessor or a wix variable (e.g. -var var.MySource will become File/@Source="$(var.MySource)\myfile.txt" and -var wix.MySource will become File/@Source="!(wix.MySource)\myfile.txt".

I use this by running the heat command in the post-build event of the original project, and passing in -var var.$(ProjectName).TargetDir. The resulting File will have Source="$(var.ProjectName.TargetDir)\whatever.dll". As long as ProjectName is added as a reference to the wix setup project then the variable will be resolved properly.