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How to find the Windows Installer XML node in Visual Studio 2019 after toolset and extension installation?

I am trying to create an installer with Wix and Visual Studio 2019. I am a Wix newbie so I just started to get something really simple working, from scratch. Therefore, I read this explanation. I use Windows 10 build 19042.

Creating the winforms project does work fine for me but the next project does not. This is because of this step.

Choose the Windows Installer XML node in the Project types tree, then select Setup Project

I can find Wix projects.

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And I installed the Wix toolset.

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So creating a very simple installer should be very simple. But in fact, it is not as I fail to do one tutorial step referring to a project type I cannot find.

You can help in these ways:

  1. Tell me what to do the make sure the Windows Installer XML node becomes visible.
  2. Provide the step to do the same without the Windows Installer XML node.

And logically, I double checked if the Windows Installer XML node is really not there. And it really is not.

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Solution

  • VS2017 vs VS2019: I guess that explanation was written for Visual Studio 2017 - which is quite different for the "New Project" dialog. You can select "WiX" in the drop down button that says "All languages" in that dialog

    WiX Project Types: Just double click the "Setup Project for WiX v3" - this is the project type that creates an MSI. The "Bootstrapper Project for WiX v3" is for making setup.exe bundles.

    WiX Downloads: For the record, make sure you have installed both WiX itself and the WiX Visual Studio Extension. It looks like you already have (just mentioned for others who see this).

    WiX Training: I have a few answers on WiX crash course and training material:

    A few selected examples from github (there are more WiX projects at the root level):