Programatically determine installation location for InDesign CS3, CS4, CS5, AND CS5.5 (Windows)

Question

We build plug-ins for all versions of InDesign from CS3 and later, for Windows and Mac.
To deploy our plug-in(s) on Windows, we use InstallShield, which has a somewhat complicated mechanism to locate InDesign.exe and determine its version so we know which plug-in(s) to install, but basically, the location is determined (via the RegLocator table in InstallShield) based on this registry setting:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Paths\InDesign.exe
This has been working fine for all versions of InDesign since CS2.  However, that location is apparently no longer set by the InDesign CS5.5 installer.  So, we need to find some other way of programatically locating InDesign CS5.5 with our installer.
I've searched the registry of a machine with InDesign CS5.5  installed, and there are other registry entries related to InDesign, but those  entries are not set by earlier versions of the InDesign installer.  Ideally, there would be a registry setting, or some other reliable marker we can use to locate the InDesign installation, which is consistent across all versions of InDesign (at least back to CS3).
Using the registry setting is something we came up with on our own via  trial-and-error, since, as far as I know, there is no documented way to  locate the InDesign  installation folder.  (Our Mac installer uses a simpler mechanism to locate InDesign by the application name and version number.)
I find the apparent lack of documentation on this a bit ironic, since just about every other aspect of the SDK and the methods for creating InDesign plug-ins is extremely well documented, expect for the last final bit one needs to know to get to the promised land of actually deploying a carefully crafted plug-in to customers' machines.  (This seems to be true of the Acrobat SDK as well.)  However, I could have just missed the relevant documentation, in which case, please point me to it.
So, is there a recommended way to programatically  locate the InDesign installation location on Windows?  How are other people doing this in their installers?

Answer 1

Hi Dan,
this is the InDesign plugins SDK forum, you need the installer forum....
Just kidding. I use a really hacky piece of VB to install my plugins while I'm developing...
here's the bit which works out the folder depending on which version I'm compiling for.
That gives you the gist anyway, and I imagine that most installers are going to do more or less the same thing, except they'll have short cuts ways of getting it.
There's probably a better way, but this works for me...
    Private Function DiscoverApplicationFolderFromName(ByRef strApplicationName As String) As String
        Dim strApplicationSignature As String
        Dim strDefaultPath As String
        If (g_strCreativeSuiteVersion = CREATIVE_SUITE_5) Then
            ' special case for CS5, because a debug machine might have CS5 or CS5.5 or both installed.
            ' plugins built with the SDK for 5.5 will not run in CS5 apps
            strApplicationSignature = strApplicationName + ".Application." + CREATIVE_SUITE_55
            Dim strInCopyPath = DiscoverApplicationFolderFromSignature(strApplicationSignature, "")
            If (strInCopyPath <> "") Then
                g_strCreativeSuiteVersion = CREATIVE_SUITE_55
                Return strInCopyPath
            End If
        End If
        strApplicationSignature = strApplicationName + ".Application." + g_strCreativeSuiteVersion
        strDefaultPath = "C:\Program Files\Adobe\Adobe " + strApplicationName + " " + g_strCreativeSuiteVersion + "\" + strApplicationName + ".exe"
        Return DiscoverApplicationFolderFromSignature(strApplicationSignature, strDefaultPath)
    End Function
    Private Function DiscoverApplicationFolderFromSignature(ByRef strApplicationSignature As String, ByRef strDefaultPath As String) As String
        Dim strApplicationPath As String = DiscoverApplicationPathFromCLSID(strApplicationSignature, strDefaultPath)
        If (strApplicationPath = "") Then
            Return ""
        End If
        Dim strDirectory As String = Path.GetDirectoryName(strApplicationPath)
        ' Get rid of the trailing Debug because this depends on whether we install the Debug or Release version first or second.
        ' It will be added on again if we're using a Debug Configuration
        Dim strDebugTag As String = " Debug"
        If strDirectory.EndsWith(" Debug") Then
            strDirectory = strDirectory.Substring(0, strDirectory.Length - strDebugTag.Length)
        End If
        Return strDirectory
    End Function
    Private Function DiscoverApplicationPathFromCLSID(ByRef strApplicationSignature As String, ByRef strDefaultPath As String) As String
        Dim strApplicationPath As String = strDefaultPath
        Try
            Dim strKey As String = strApplicationSignature + "\CLSID"
            Dim regKey As RegistryKey = Registry.ClassesRoot.OpenSubKey(strKey)
            Dim strGUID As String = regKey.GetValue("")
            regKey.Close()
            If IsRegistryVirualized() Then
                strKey = "Wow6432Node\CLSID\" + strGUID + "\LocalServer32"
            Else
                strKey = "CLSID\" + strGUID + "\LocalServer32"
            End If
            regKey = Registry.ClassesRoot.OpenSubKey(strKey)
            strApplicationPath = regKey.GetValue("")
            regKey.Close()
        Catch ex As Exception
            LogMessage("FAILED DiscoverApplicationPathFromCLSID: " + strApplicationSignature)
            strApplicationPath = strDefaultPath
        End Try
        Return strApplicationPath
    End Function