Silent installation of a MSI package

Question

I have a MSI package that I need to install if the package is not already installed. Also I need to install it silently. The package prompts user for:

• Installation location (C:\Program Files\Foobar)
• Install type: minimal and full (minimal)

I need to override these two parameters using command line parameters or some other method. So how do I go about these two issues. I'll use VBScript for scripting.

Answer 1

You should be able to use the /quiet or /qn options with msiexec to perform a silent install.

MSI packages export public properties, which you can set with the PROPERTY=value syntax on the end of the msiexec parameters.

For example, this command installs a package with no UI and no reboot, with a log and two properties:

msiexec /i c:\path\to\package.msi /quiet /qn /norestart /log c:\path\to\install.log PROPERTY1=value1 PROPERTY2=value2 

You can read the options for msiexec by just running it with no options from Start -> Run.

Answer 2

The proper way to install an MSI silently is via the msiexec.exe command line as follows:

msiexec.exe /i c:\setup.msi /QN /L*V "C:\Temp\msilog.log" 

Quick explanation:

 /L*V "C:\Temp\msilog.log"= verbose logging  /QN = run completely silently  /i = run install sequence  

There is a much more comprehensive answer here: Batch script to install MSI. This answer provides details on the msiexec.exe command line options and a description of how to find the "public properties" that you can set on the command line at install time. These properties are generally different for each MSI.