Get install date from managed code

Question

Is there a managed API to retrieve an application's install date using the Product GUID?

Thanks. Scott

Answer 1

The "proper" way to get to that information is to use ::MsiGetProductInfo(). PInvoke should be trivial.

Answer 2

Thanks Rob! I've added a complete C# example below.

    [DllImport("msi.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]
    static extern Int32 MsiGetProductInfo(string product, string property, [Out] StringBuilder valueBuf, ref Int32 len);

    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        Int32 len = 512;
        var builder = new StringBuilder(len);
        MsiGetProductInfo("{0db93d2f-a9e7-417f-9425-5e61e82c0868}", "InstallDate", builder, ref len);

        var installDate = DateTime.ParseExact(builder.ToString(), "yyyyMMdd", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture);

        Console.WriteLine(installDate);
    }

Answer 3

I don't know about any API which will do that, but you could try to read the value from the Registry directly. Check the following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\{product-id}
    InstallDate = 20081004

The information stored under the Uninstall key is displayed e.g. in Control Panel -> Add or Remove Programs.

Answer 4

The InstallDate key in the registry is not always there, especially when the program has not been installed with through MSI (as for example Adobe Flash Player Plugin, DAEMON Tools, 7-ZIP, Picasa, TeamViewer, Mozilla Firefox).

Answer 5

Another "proper" way is to get the creation date of some file you know for "sure" is added by installer. In my case it's "unins000.exe" which is (re)created by Inno setup v5. No PInvoke involved but simply use FileInfo's Exists and CreationTime properties!