Spec #2405 - Manifests without installer info

[Trenly]

📖 Description

This PR introduces the specification for the NoInstaller installer type (Issue #2405), enabling WinGet to recognize and manage packages that have no downloadable installer. The specification covers the complete design for:

• Installer Type Support — New NoInstaller enum value in InstallerTypeEnum
• Manifest Schema — New InstallerAvailabilityMessage field (manifest v1.30.0) with field constraints
• CLI Behavior — Install, upgrade, show, search, and uninstall command handling
• ARP Correlation — Using ProductCode and AppsAndFeaturesEntries for managing pre-installed software
• Use Cases — System components, pre-installed software, out-of-band distributions, version tombstones
• Validation — Validation-NoExecutables waiver requirement for community repository
• Architecture & Locale Scenarios — Mixed installability and availability across architectures and locales
• Future Enhancements — Issue Support for filtering packages on installer method #823 installer filtering with default exclusion of NoInstaller packages

The specification addresses all design feedback from PR #6157 and provides a comprehensive reference for implementation across winget-cli, winget-create, winget-cli-restsource, and winget-pkgs.

🔗 References

• Manifests without installer info #2405 — Manifests without installer info
• Add support for Manifests with No Installers #6157 — Add support for Manifests with No Installers (implementation PR)
• Package Tombstones #1900 — Version tombstones
• Support for filtering packages on installer method #823 — Filtering on installer method / installer type

🔍 Validation

No validation needed — This is a specification document that describes design intent and expected behavior. No code changes, manifests, or executable artifacts are included.

✅ Checklist

• Signed the Contributor License Agreement
• Linked to an issue
• Updated Release Notes (if applicable)
• Updated documentation (if applicable) — Specification document added
• Updated Copilot instructions (if build, architecture, or conventions changed)

📋 Issue Type

• Bug fix
• Feature
• Task — Specification documentation

[denelon]

We should test the actual behavior to see what errors/warnings happen if we do this. We may need to consider when the right time is to roll this out into production for the community repository, and what default versions of WinGet on various OS versions will do.

[Trenly]

PS E:\winget-cli> wingetdev validate E:\winget-pkgs\manifests\b\Badlion\BadlionClient\3.1.9
Manifest validation succeeded.
PS E:\winget-cli> wingetdev show -m E:\winget-pkgs\manifests\b\Badlion\BadlionClient\3.1.9
Found Badlion Client [Badlion.BadlionClient]
Version: 3.1.9
Publisher: Badlion
Publisher Support Url: https://support.badlion.net/
Moniker: blc
Description: Badlion Client is a Minecraft launcher with many added features. It includes anticheat, built-in FPS boost and other mods, and is compatible with most versions of minecraft 1.7 or newer.
License: Proprietary
Copyright: © 2013-2021 ESL Gaming Online, Inc.
Tags:
  minecraft
  optifine
Installer:
  Installer Type: noinstaller
  Installer Locale: en-US
  Installer SHA256: 85f8124a876d702319807b5604814c07d9099b43863f585543f2f1b1c95cdf1d
  Offline Distribution Supported: false
  Installer Availability Message: This is for testing only
PS E:\winget-cli> winget install -m E:\winget-pkgs\manifests\b\Badlion\BadlionClient\3.1.9
Found Badlion Client [Badlion.BadlionClient] Version 3.1.9
This application is licensed to you by its owner.
Microsoft is not responsible for, nor does it grant any licenses to, third-party packages.
An unexpected error occurred while executing the command:
0x80004003 : Invalid pointer
PS E:\winget-cli> winget -v
v1.28.240