diff -r 3114f26d5d54 Lib/msilib/__init__.py
--- a/Lib/msilib/__init__.py	Tue Mar 22 10:46:35 2011 +0100
+++ b/Lib/msilib/__init__.py	Sat Mar 26 20:23:10 2011 +0800
@@ -172,10 +172,9 @@
         add_data(db, table, getattr(module, table))
 
 def make_id(str):
-    #str = str.replace(".", "_") # colons are allowed
-    str = str.replace(" ", "_")
-    str = str.replace("-", "_")
-    if str[0] in string.digits:
+    identifier_chars = string.ascii_letters + string.digits + "._"
+    str = "".join([c if c in identifier_chars else "_" for c in str])
+    if str[0] in string.digits + ".":
         str = "_"+str
     assert re.match("^[A-Za-z_][A-Za-z0-9_.]*$", str), "FILE"+str
     return str
diff -r 3114f26d5d54 Lib/msilib/test/test___init__.py
--- /dev/null	Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 1970 +0000
+++ b/Lib/msilib/test/test___init__.py	Sat Mar 26 20:23:10 2011 +0800
@@ -0,0 +1,49 @@
+""" Test suite for the code in msilib.__init__ """
+
+# Testing imports
+import unittest
+
+# Python imports
+import os.path
+
+# Local imports
+import msilib
+
+class Test_make_id(unittest.TestCase):
+    #http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa369212(v=vs.85).aspx
+    """The Identifier data type is a text string. Identifiers may contain the
+    ASCII characters A-Z (a-z), digits, underscores (_), or periods (.).
+    However, every identifier must begin with either a letter or an
+    underscore.
+    """
+
+    def is_no_change_required(self, string):
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id("short"), "short")
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id("nochangerequired"), "nochangerequired")
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id("one.dot"), "one.dot")
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id("_"), "_")
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id("a"), "a")
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id(""), "")
+
+    def test_invalid_first_char(self):
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id("9.short"), "_9.short")
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id(".short"), "_.short")
+
+    def test_invalid_any_char(self):
+        self.assertEqual(
+            msilib.make_id(".s\x82ort"), "_.s_ort")
+        self.assertEqual    (
+            msilib.make_id(".s\x82o?*+rt"), "_.s_o___rt")
+
+
+if __name__ == "__main__":
+    unittest.main()
+