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  • Command Line Installation of Vectorworks 2025

    Tim Ardoin

    By Tim Ardoin

    NOTE: This article is intended for IT professionals with an understanding of the command line/terminal interface. 
     

    This article is not intended for all users and is not a required procedure for installing Vectorworks in a standard work environment. Do not use these steps unless you are specifically attempting to initiate a silent install of Vectorworks in a network environment or are specifically instructed to do so by Vectorworks Technical Support.

     

    The Vectorworks installer provides a command line interface for driving a silent installation from the command line.

     

    Windows:

    • We will use a temporary folder at C:\tmp (as an example) to store the necessary files.
    • We recommend using 7-zip for Windows to extract the necessary files.
    • If your installation is also offline, you will need an LDF file from the Customer Portal. Copy this file to C:\tmp.
    • Download a copy of the Windows Vectorworks Install Manager from the Customer Portal into C:\tmp.
      • This is an exe file, but it's a self-extracting archive and can be treated as a .zip file.
      • This exe will be named something like "Vectorworks 2025 Install Manager XXXXXX.exe".
    • Right click the exe file and choose 7-Zip-> Extract to <name>, and extract the archive to a folder.
      • This will create a folder such as Vectorworks 2025 Install Manager 776367.
      • Rename this folder to "VWIM" to follow the rest of this example.
    • Start an administrator command prompt and type the following commands depending on what you want to do:
    • cd c:\tmp\VWIM\resources
      • This puts you in the resources folder where the command line scripts are found.
    • To get information about the available commands:
      • cli.bat
    • To get information about a specific command:
      • cli.bat <command> --help
      • Specific example:
        • cli.bat download --help
    • To see the list of potential updates/targets:
      • cli.bat download --ls
    • To download a .vwupdate file:
      • cli.bat download --dest c:\tmp --target <target>
      • Specific example:
        • cli.bat download --dest c:\tmp --target Update0
        • This will download a file Update0.vwim into c:\tmp that can later be used to do an offline update or full install.
      • Note that alternately you can use the Install Manager GUI to easily download a .vwim file.
    • To perform an install from online sources:
      • cli.bat install --installdir "C:\Program Files\Vectorworks 2025" --serial "ELXXXX-XXXXXX-XXXXXX-XXXXXX"
    • To perform an install from offline (local) sources:
      • cli.bat install --installdir "C:\Program Files\Vectorworks 2025" --serial "ELXXXX-XXXXXX-XXXXXX-XXXXXX" -i "C:\tmp\Update0.vwim" --ldf \tmp\XX-XXXXXX.ldf
        • This uses the previously downloaded vwim file Update0.vwim.
        • This uses the previously download ldf file XX-XXXXXX.ldf (from the Customer Portal).

    MacOS:

    • For this example we will use the folder /tmp/vwim. You can create and change to this folder by opening a terminal and typing:
      • cd /tmp && mkdir vwim && cd vwim
    • Download the latest Mac Vectorworks Install Manager.zip from the Customer Portal.
      • This will be named similar to: Vectorworks 2025 Install Manager-30.0.776374-mac.zip
      • For this example, we will rename this zip file to vwim.zip and copy it to /tmp/vwim.
    • If you're performing an offline update:
      • Download a LDF file from the Customer Portal.
        • Copy this into /tmp/vwim, for example /tmp/vwim/XX-XXXXXX.ldf
    • Extract the VWIM.zip:
      • unzip vwim.zip
      • This creates "Vectorworks 2025 Install Manager.app" inside /tmp/vwim.
    • Enter the resources folder (a simplification for this example)
      • cd "Vectorworks 2025 Install Manager.app/Contents/Resources"
    • On MacOS, we will use the "sudo" command to gain administrator access. Because of how sudo and users work, we need to gather information about the user account that will be the owner/main user of Vectorworks. Specifically we need the uid (user ID) and gid (group ID) of the user.
      • In this example we will use commands to put the user and group ids into variables and also print them out.
      • export myUid=$(id -u) && print "User $USER id: $myUid stored in variable myUid"
      • export myGid=$(id -g) && print "User $USER gid: $myGid stored in variable myGid"
      • Now we have the variables $myUid and $myGid ready to use in subsequent commands below.
    • We are now ready to issue commands to the command line interface.
    • To get information about the available commands:
      • ./cli.sh
    • To get information about a specific command:
      • ./cli.sh <command> --help
      • Specific example:
        • ./cli.sh download --help
    • To see the list of potential updates/targets:
      • ./cli.sh download --ls
    • To download a .vwupdate file:
      • ./cli.sh download --dest <path> --target <target>
      • Specific example:
        • ./cli.sh download --dest /tmp/vwim --target Update0
        • This will download a file Update0.vwim into /tmp that can later be used to do an offline update or full install.
      • Note that alternately you can use the Install Manager GUI to easily download a .vwim file.
    • To perform an install from online sources:
      • sudo ./cli.sh install --installdir "/Applications/Vectorworks 2025" --serial "ELXXXX-XXXXXX-XXXXXX-XXXXXX" --uid $myUid --gid $myGid
        • Note we're using the uid and gid variables we stored earlier in this guide.
        • This will install Vectorworks and give ownership and access to the specified user.
        • The source files and ldf file will be retrieved online automatically during installation.
    • To perform an install from offline (local) sources:
      • sudo ./cli.sh install --installdir "/Applications/Vectorworks 2025" --serial "ELXXXX-XXXXXX-XXXXXX-XXXXXX" -i "/tmp/vwim/Update0.vwim" --ldf /tmp/vwim/XX-XXXXXX.ldf --uid $myUid --gid $myGid
        • This uses the previously downloaded vwim file Update0.vwim.
        • This uses the previously download ldf file XX-XXXXXX.ldf (from the Customer Portal).

     

     

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    User Feedback


    jarradwelsh

    Thank you! I was looking for this and thanks to Support from Melbourne Ben was able to point me in the right direction to this.

    • Like 1
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    JBPSAV

     

    There are discussions in your forums for this solution. I assume there is another. For G keys, the LDF is not required. Or was not in the past and had a passthrough.

     

    Start-Process -Wait -FilePath ".\resources\installer\Install Vectorworks2024.exe" -ArgumentList '--mode unattended','--unattendedmodeui none','--Serial "G#######################" ','--installdir "C:\Program Files\Vectorworks 2024" --LDFChoice licenseID' -passthru

     

    What should the new command be as it is not listed in the commands via running cli.bat.

     

    When trying to run online or offline options:

     

    Could not download LDF. If this is an offline installation, please supply a local LDF file with --ldf <file>
    Could not get a valid LDF.

     

    Thank you!

    Link to comment
    JBPSAV

    I believe I have found the issue. I did not have to use the LDF command, once I had the proper G key. Thank you!

    Link to comment
    bernhardm

    Hi, thanks for the new silent install feature. I like the vwim solution.

     

    is there an option for silent uninstall too?

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    RMPSL

    Why do you always have to fiddle with the installer for every major release? It this some kind of occupational therapy for the devs?
    So far, every single time, I've had to spend at least half a day of work to get the new release ready to be installed silently with our DM.
    Other solutions don't do this. Most provide an MSI and I'm done in less than half an hour.

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