>I finally got installsheild express 3.5 in VFP 8 to work. Problem is that it only does an all or nothing install. For first install that is ok. But in the future I will want to only distribute files that changed, i.e. the application (exe) file and selected tables.
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>I do NOT want force an uninstall of the current version and I DEFINITELY do NOT want to wipe the tables which wiil contain the current data.

Are you using Installshield Express Lite for VFP? IOW, the free version of IS that comes with VFP out of the box? If so, then, that the functionality you are looking for is available in the purchased version of Installshield Express. I upgraded to 4.0 finally because of this very issue. It's been a tremendous help.

A couple of comments WRT to the data. IS, any version, should only remove files in an uninstall that were originally installed during setup. I recommend, heartily and without any hesitation, using Stonefield Data Toolkit to manage data changes. This means that you can distribute just meta data, and then when the app runs, create the structures that are needed for the live system. Then you never have to distribute data in setups. There are more ways this can be a problem than just the example you raise here.

HTH.