An MSI file is a Windows installer package file which is used to install software in Windows. Many software authors just pack their software programs in an MSI package which you can download from the internet. Some of these software do not really need to be installed on your computer and can be run in the portable mode. For such software you can just extract the files from the MSI package and run the program from the extraction target folder. Here is how :
- Press the keyboard shortcut Windows Logo Key + R to open the Run dialog.
- Type cmd in the Run dialog and press Enter to start the Command Prompt window.
- In the commad prompt window, type the following command to extract the files from the MSI package.
msiexec /a “C:\software.msi” /qb TARGETDIR=”C:\Folder”
Here C:\Software.msi is the MSI software package file and C:\Folder is the target folder where the files would be extracted. The files would be extracted to the specified target folder in a few seconds.
If you want you can also add the right-click menu for extracting files from an MSI package. This way you can right-click on a MSI package and choose Extract to extract the files contained within the MSI installer package.
To add the right-click menu for MSI extraction, download the right_click_msi.zip. Extract the contents to a folder and double-click on the add_right_click_menu.reg. If later you decide to remove this menu, then just double-click on the remove_right_click_menu.reg.