Visual Studio: How to automatically uninstall previous installed version?

balexandre picture balexandre · Sep 7, 2011 · Viewed 38.9k times · Source

I have a simple Web Setup project that reads from a Deployable Project.

Even though I have set the Setup to DetectNewerInstalledVersion to false I always get that annoying alert box that a previous installation exists and I need to go to the Control Panel and find the software to remove it...

Is there a way to add a script in a new new installation Dialog that could say A previous version was found, press NEXT to uninstall it. ?

Answer

cosmin picture cosmin · Sep 7, 2011

Older versions are uninstalled automatically if you increase your Product Version and change the Package Code. This needs to be done each time you modify the setup project and build a new package.

If you keep the same version and Product Code, older builds cannot be uninstalled automatically. They are detected by Windows Installer before your new package is actually launched. So you need to uninstall them manually.