NOTE: This article is intended for IT professionals with an understanding of the command line/terminal interface.
Legacy (VWIM Command Line):
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. We also provide a native .msi package on Windows and .pkg package on MacOS. We suggest and expect you will want to use the native packages, and that is what this document explains. For the Install Manager's command line interface, please reference the Command Line Installation of Vectorworks 2025 document, as the interface is unchanged.
MSI (Windows):
The MSI is available in the Customer Portal downloads section or by choosing "Advanced" from the VWIM triple bar menu. It is provided as a zip file. The zip file contains the msi file itself, .cab files that contain the payload, a productcode.txt file, and finally an "install.bat" file that can simplify and/or serve as a base for your install process.
To install Vectorworks, a few arguments must be passed to the MSI to provide the serial, LDF (License Description File), and Installation Directory. The install.bat file clarifies and checks these options, as well as checking for proper privileges and creating a log file.
The usage of install.bat is:
install.bat "Vectorworks2026.msi" "C:\Program Files\Vectorworks 2026" "ABCDDE-XXXXXX-XXXXXX-LLLLLL" "c:\mytemp\DD-LLLLLL.ldf" "msiLog.txt"
The parameters are, in order:
- The path and filename of the .msi file (not the zip).
- The install directory
- The serial number
-
An LDF file, previously downloaded
- This can be an empty string ( "" ) . If so, the MSI will attempt to fetch the LDF file from our servers based on the serial number. If successful, that fetched LDF will be used.
- A path and filename to a log file, useful to diagnose problems. Please note that this file may contain the serial number as msiexec will log it.
The batch file runs msiexec on the msi, passing the requested parameters. It's possible to use msiexec directly, and the .bat file can be used as a reference for how to do this.
Also in the batch file are instructions for doing a command-line uninstall.
PKG (MacOS):
On mac, a .pkg file is provided. This is available by clicking "Advanced" from the triple bar menu in the Install Manager. This file requires a configuration .plist file placed next to it, so it can retrieve the serial number, a path to the LDF file, and an optional list of users for which to store serial number information. The plist file must be named vw2026.plist, and must be located next to the .pkg file. Here is a sample plist file:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd"> <plist version="1.0"> <dict> <key>users</key> <array> <dict> <key>username</key> <string>user1</string> <key>serial</key> <string>EMXDDM-XXXXXX-XXXXXX-LLLLLL</string> </dict> </array> <key>serial</key> <string>EMXDDM-XXXXXX-XXXXXX-LLLLLL</string> <key>ldf</key> <string>/tmp/DD-LLLLLL.ldf</string> </dict> </plist>
The "users" array is optional and will cause the postinstall script in the pkg to create the licensing plists and copy the LDF into a user folder for each entry. The outer "serial" will be copied to the system location /Library/Preferences. Additionally, the outer "serial" and "ldf" keys are used internally to determine which features of Vectorworks to install.
Note that user1, the serial numbers, and the LDF name should be customized to match your items.
Once the plist file is created, the following command can be used to install the pkg:
sudo installer -pkg ./Vectorworks2026.pkg -target /Applications
It is currently required that Vectorworks installed via a pkg is installed to /Applications/Vectorworks 2026/.
Note that once installed, MacOS remembers this install. To install a second time (for example if you delete the install folder), you must first tell macOS to forget it as follows:
sudo pkgutil --forget net.nemetschek.vectorworks.installer
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