CyberInstaller Suite vs makeself

CyberInstaller Suite helps developers build software installation packages for Windows projects made with a range of languages and development environments. CyberInstaller Studio provides a graphical interface and wizard for creating packages, which can be compressed into self-extracting executables. Other modules include Installer, Extractor, Updater, CIPEW and Downloader. Output options include self-extracting files, CD/DVD packages and web pages linking to downloads; command-line packaging and silent installation are also supported. Find Dependencies checks Visual Basic, Delphi and.NET projects, plus executables, and can add required runtime files. Installers can download prerequisites that were not embedded in a package, and distributed applications can receive online updates. With rollback enabled, the installer records system changes and can restore the earlier state during removal. Digital signing is available for package files and the package itself without modifying the originals. The free license is limited to freeware packages; commercial packaging is permitted with Professional and Enterprise licenses. Windows Vista, Server 2008, 7, 8.x, 10 and 11 are listed as supported. Prices are free, €39.90, paid once, €129.90, paid once and €169.90, paid once.

makeself is a shell script for packaging directories as self-extracting compressed TAR archives. Each archive includes a shell stub that extracts its contents to a temporary directory and can run an optional command, such as an installation script, before removing temporary files. Archive options let users list files, check integrity, select an extraction target, request confirmation or skip the embedded command. Compression choices include gzip, bzip2, bzip3, xz, lz4 and zstd, among other compressors; using a non-default method requires the corresponding compressor to be installed for extraction. Archives can include CRC or MD5 checksums, with optional SHA256 support. Creation also offers GPG and OpenSSL encryption, which requires those tools on the archive user's system. The project aims to avoid Bash-specific features and run on Unix-compatible systems with a compatible Bourne shell and the required compression programs. It lists Linux, macOS, several Unix and BSD systems, and Windows through Cygwin or WSL among tested platforms. makeself is free and covered by GNU General Public License version 2 and above; generated archives do not have to use that license. The project notes that archives made before version 2.1.2 may have extraction problems on some GNU/Linux distributions because of obsolete head and tail syntax.