How do I ensure my winform application deployment overwrites old versions

Question

I have created a msi install package for my project from the VS2008 deployment project. but I am having problems when it comes to upgrading installs, The previously installed version does not get overwritten. How do I ensure that previously installed versions get overwritten?

Answer 1

1. In Visual Studio select your Setup project within the Solution Explorer
2. Open the Properties Window
   • don't right click and select properties.
   • select View - Properties Window
3. set RemovePreviousVersions to true
4. increment the version to a higher number
5. select yes in the upcoming message box

If you built and deploy this new setup, a setup with an older version number will be deleted.

Important: the setup version number is completely independent from your application or assembly version number!