Deploy the "msiexec.exe abc.msi" Package

Question

Deploy the "msiexec.exe abc.msi" Package

Chethan Venkat 21

I need to deploy "ABC.msi" package in Azure web app server but not able to Deploy and not getting detail information in Azure documents as well.

I tried to deploy using "d:/windows/system32>msiexec.exe -i ABCSetup.msi" but it throwing the Access Denied error

I left with no option to resolve this error/deployment issue.

Please help me out on this.

Thanks
Chethan.V

0 comments

Answer accepted by question author

0 additional answers

Your answer

Answer 1

Ryan Hill 30,336 Microsoft Employee Moderator

Hi @Chethan Venkat ,

You can't deploy MSI's to Azure. That would involve executing and having the permissions to install the package. Furthermore, Static Web Apps (you tagged it as such), can only accept static code deployments of specific runtimes. Only HTML, JavaScript frameworks, CSS, and images are supported; see What you can do with Static Web Apps. For general App Service, for which Static Web Apps are based, run on a Sandbox environment which restricts access to underlying components.

If you're packaging your web application inside an MSI, there are many different ways to deploy your code; from a Zip, FTP, through CI/CD or GitHub actions; just to name a few.

Chethan Venkat 21 Reputation points

2021-08-20T06:18:08.063+00:00

Hi @Ryan Hill ,

Thanks for the response.

Actually we are deploying the ".msi" package through Azure CICD pipeline and deployment option as 'Run from Package' to azure web app server, since we need to send complete package to client we are following ".msi" format. hence we need to deploy our .net project in ".msi" format itself.

As you said this "That would involve executing and having the permissions to install the package." can you please elaborate it. Permissions is in the context of code signing or other permission in web app server we need to get.

My mistake -- this is not "Static Web Apps" wrongly selected tag.

Please let me know if I am missing anything here and your help will be much appreciate.

Thanks
Chethan.V
Ryan Hill 30,336 Reputation points Microsoft Employee Moderator

2021-08-20T16:13:03.317+00:00

No worries @Chethan Venkat , I'll retag. When you say...

since we need to send complete package to client we are following ".msi" format

Who is the client? Is it your app service or app services owned by different people? You still can't deploy an MSI to an Azure App Service. You will have to adjust your pipeline to use .zip as instructed on https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/pipelines/targets/webapp?view=azure-devops&tabs=yaml#deploy-a-web-deploy-package-aspnet.
Chethan Venkat 21 Reputation points

2021-08-23T06:32:58.17+00:00

The Client is our customer(end user)

As you said we can not deploy 'msi' into web app service and 'zip deploy' is not in our deployment scope.

In this scenario can Azure VM will be the alternative for our requirement ?
can we deploy ".msi" package through CICD in Azure VM ?

Thanks
Chethan.V
Ryan Hill 30,336 Reputation points Microsoft Employee Moderator

2021-08-23T14:44:56.563+00:00

Just for clarification, your client (end user) is accessing ABC from an App Service?

In this scenario can Azure VM will be the alternative for our requirement ? can we deploy ".msi" package through CICD in Azure VM

You can, have a look at this solution idea. There are document links that will lead you to various pipeline flows, but the gist is after you push your MSI to the VM, you will configure your pipeline to execute the scripting to install the package on the VM.
Chethan Venkat 21 Reputation points

2021-08-23T19:11:58.057+00:00

No, we are deploying our application into web app for staging not for production once it is certified from testing same package will be published to end client environment.

I am refering the same link you provided in the comment just wanted make sure before investing time on trouble shooting on 'MSI' deployment in VM

@Ryan Hill Thanks for the assistance.
Ajay Kumar N 28,261 Reputation points Microsoft Employee Moderator

2021-08-24T06:40:08.327+00:00
@Chethan Venkat ,

Thanks for sharing additional info. As @Ryan Hill mentioned, Azure VM could be fine choice best on your requirement. As for as comparing, Azure VMs vs Azure App Service - being a PAAS solution provides more control to the underlying VMs (compared to App service), you can install your own software on VMs that use Azure VMs, and also can access them remotely. We’re also following-up with you offline on this.

Additional info:

Further comparing with IaaS, such as Azure VMs, you first create and configure the environment your application runs in. Then you deploy your application into this environment. You're responsible for managing much of this world, by doing things such as deploying new patched versions of the operating system in each VM. In PaaS, by contrast, it's as if the environment already exists. All you have to do is deploy your application. Management of the platform it runs on, including deploying new versions of the operating system, is handled for you.

Azure offers a number of ways to host your application code. The term compute refers to the hosting model for the computing resources that your application runs on. The flowchart in the doc, will help you to choose a compute service for your application.

This article helps you understand the options and make the right choice for your web application.

Share via

Deploy the "msiexec.exe abc.msi" Package

0 additional answers

Your answer