The present invention provides for automatically installing software on heterogeneous computer systems. In a distributed system having heterogeneous computer systems having dissimilar hardware or software components or dissimilar configuration information, such as different natural languages, different operating system types, different network operating system types, and different processor types, the present invention automatically installs the appropriate edition of software on computers. The present invention installs an edition of software appropriate for use with a specific operating system type, appropriate for execution on a particular processor type and in a particular natural language by utilizing commands specific to an operating system and network operating system type. The present invention automatically installs software in response to user input, the addition of a new computer to the distributed system, or upon the availability of a new version of the software.