I've already raised this but in the wrong forum so I'll try again:

I'm using a Deployment Project in Visual Studio 2008.  I have a custom action on the Install event to create a database and configure mail settings when the web application is installed.  If however I install a newer version of the application, the custom action for the new version fires and I don't want it to.  How can I stop this other than running msiexec and passing in a parameter such as "upgrade=true" to the msi file?

I set the condition "not Installed" on the Install action, but it makes no difference.  An old post explains why:

Understand that "Installed" means mainly "is my ProductCode
guid already installed", so if you change that guid (as you *must* for
RemovePreviousVersions to work) "Not Installed" is a meaningless test.

(http://www.dotnetmonster.com/Uwe/Forum.aspx/vs-setup/1210/Not-Installed-launch-condition-backfired-with-Visual-Studio-Installer)

 When executing .exe, the custom action will be invoked. You can try to set a flag in target machine, and check this flag to determine whether to install database.

Yes, that worked.  In the Install custom event, I check for a WebsiteInstalled flag.  If it's set then I know a previous version of the app is installed and continue with the the upgrade logic.  If it's not set then I set it and continue with the full installation logic.

 Thanks!