MySQL Installer

I spent much of the last week fiddling with Inno Setup to create a MySQL installer for win32. The installer asks for the program install directory (and suggests a default) and the location of the data directory (and suggests a default). It independently installs MySQL server, ODBC, and GUI tools based on check boxes. That's it. It's pretty slick.

Why not just use the .msi installers that MySQL provides, you ask? Well, my installer is going out to dozens of sites and the configuration is set beforehand and is bound to our commercial application. The MySQL .msi installers ask dozens of configuration questions and we're looking to reduce that and to prevent the sysadmins who are installing our application from making wrong choices. For example, we must run the InnoDB engine only and never the non-transactional MyISAM engine. That's a choice the the MySQL .msi installer gives but we do not. My installer also automatically configures users, passwords, databases, tables, and access.

Sadly, this work invalidates my company's decision to standardize on PostgreSQL. Management decided to opt for short-term expediency instead of long-term robustness and scalability. Brilliant. (sarcasm) That won't come back to haunt them. (dripping sarcasm)