I’ve been promising myself I’d get a video up demonstrating ThinApp Converter for quite a while now, especially since the discovery that ThinApp Converter doesn’t work using ESX 4.1 (see VMware discussion post here)

It does however work on VMware Workstation 7.1.3, video posted on YouTube

So the basics are as follows…

• Workstation 7.1.3
  • 1 Source & Destination VM (hosts Source files and is destination for Capture)
  • 2 Capture & Builds VMs
• ThinApp 4.6
  • Includes ThinAppConverter.exe

During this demonstration (and for most of the Capture work I undertake in fact) the Build isn’t completed at Capture time – I prefer to fish out any files that aren’t required and modify the package.ini file myself prior to Build.

You can however run scripts automatically, post Capture as specified in the ThinAppConverter.ini and also provide an override.ini for Build – if you know exactly the modifications you’re looking to make that is!

Four applications are to be Captured

• 7Zip
• Acrobat Reader
• Firefox
• FileZilla

The post on the 22nd December referenced some new KB artciles from the VMware ThinApp team – these have proven most useful, especially in understanding the core mechanics of Converter – specifically today I had reason to re-read through KB103095 ‘ExclusionList parameters’ and understanding exactly how Converter goes about finding what executables are available, why and HOW it runs what it finds

So, thanks again to the guys in the VMware ThinApp team (@ThinappGuru , @SquidlyMan), oh and whilst I think about it…when’s the next release going to be available that fixes the bug with VIX, be it a patch or indeed this ‘Factory’ product I’ve heard whispers about?!?!