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Suggest a topic for a future blog post....

I am going to keep track of ideas for future blog posts with this blog article. I'll add my own ideas as they come to me, and I also welcome suggestions from anyone out there who would like to suggest a topic. I am going to use the following guidelines:

  1. Please use the comment functionality on the blog server to suggest anything you think sounds interesting
  2. Keep in mind my areas of expertise from the tag line of my blog - general setup and deployment issues, WiX, XNA Game Studio, the .NET Framework and Visual Studio. I know about things outside of these areas, but my level of depth of knowledge may vary widely depending on the topic, and I am not going to pretend to be an expert and post about a topic I am not very familiar with
  3. I will remove comments as I create posts that address them

Comments

  • Anonymous
    July 22, 2005
    I have been keeping a folder on my computer where I drop emails that I send myself with ideas for future...

  • Anonymous
    July 29, 2005
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    October 10, 2005
    Is theree any Advice on why Office Pro 03 would not upgrade as the Work 8 program is installed on my computer. I have been tossed between MS and Gateway countless times. They are not helping to discover why I can't simply Upgrade, instead of a full Office version.

  • Anonymous
    October 11, 2005
    Hey Neeley - According to the information I've been able to find so far, Office 2003 Professional Edition should allow you to upgrade from several previous versions of Microsoft Works.

    Can you let me know exactly what version of Works that you have installed on your computer? You can do that by using the steps listed at http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/archive/2005/07/01/434814.aspx to gather a list of installed products, and then send it to me at aaronste (at) microsoft (dot) com.

  • Anonymous
    October 11, 2005
    Hey Neeley - can you also search for the file named worksup.dll on your computer and if you have it installed can you tell me what version of that file is installed and where it is installed? That is one of items that Office 2003 setup looks for to determine whether or not Works 8 is installed...

  • Anonymous
    October 18, 2005
    I am a student developer at The Ohio State University and I am working with a team to attempt to develop a media center application. The only issue is we don't know how to communicate with the outside world (i.e. a database or something of the like). How about a blog tutorial on creating a C# applet or an ActiveX control that could do something along these lines?

    Thanks!

  • Anonymous
    October 26, 2005
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    October 27, 2005
    Hi Gerhard - if you are having trouble removing .NET 2.0 Beta and it is not appearing in Add/Remove Programs, I would suggest that you follow these steps:

    1. Download smartmsizap from http://astebner.sts.winisp.net/Tools/smartmsizap.zip
    2. Run smartmsizap.exe /p {7A1ADD0C-17F3-47B8-B033-A06E189C835D}

    This should forcibly remove the .NET Framework 2.0 beta 2 for you. Please contact me at http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/contact.aspx if this doesn't work for you.

  • Anonymous
    November 08, 2005
    Hi,

    In the .NET Framework 2 documentation - the System.Drawing Namespace has the following section/text (titled 'Caution') :

    'Classes within the System.Drawing namespace are not supported for use within a Windows or ASP.NET service. Attempting to use these classes from within one of these application types may produce unexpected problems, such as diminished service performance and run-time exceptions.'

    Having used this System.Drawing namespace extensively from ASP/Netv1.1 in the past (to do realtime image generation / and realtime image conversion for various clients including browsers/mobile) - I am confused as to what Microsoft expects us to use instead of this namespace in ASP.NET 2?

    While I appreciate that there may be slower performance - the part about 'unexpected problems / runtime exceptions' is a worry.

    Are you able to elaborate on this matter - and also explain if there are some classes in this system.drawing namespace that are actually considered safe to use under ASP.NET - or if there are some alternatives?

    Thanks - and hope you can help out (or even create a blog entry on this topic)!

  • Anonymous
    November 23, 2005
    Hey Aaron,

    I am having load of problems with http ports when using Webmedia player and internet radio. It is very difficult to find out which ports your Windows firewall is blocking and not. As this problem is also occuring when using the media player I think it could be a good topic in the near future. The problem that I have is that sometimes when I turn mce on from standby the media player tells me that I am not connected to the internet and therefor not possible to play the stream. If I then make a repair on the networking card it works again???!!!

  • Anonymous
    December 06, 2005
    Hey Aaron.

    I have a product that is divided into a core and multiple addins. The addins are released separately from the core. Currently the core and each one of the addins have their own installation (MSI) package. Is there a way to include the addins as (yet unimplemented) features of the core, so that the installation maintenance would be performed through one MSI package? For example, to enable these features by delivering the addins by patches or to use the "Advertise" MSI mechanism?

  • Anonymous
    December 07, 2005
    Are there any plans to add HD channels to the MsnTV Remote Record feature?

  • Anonymous
    December 08, 2005
    Always a pleasure to read Aaron's blog :)

    We supply possibly the coolest MCE platforms in the world, and these can truely see the convergence of the 'digital home' on an 'appropriate platform' - the slim, silent and cool running (<43W typical, <28dBA typical) T2eMP (AVA) PC platform......

    we are however concerned that there is no 'easy / public' window to FAQ's re MCE2005 (ie why one of our clients can't get EPG via a shared modem (dial up) - of course we all generally assume broadband is everywhere (which really is needed for online services), but sadly BB is not available (nor will be) for some....... so how about an easy to search, free FAQ web - for all MCE users ?

    Possible ?

    For hardware providers - like us, and software providers - like MS, the public, non-techy, needs real help.... how do we do that ?

    Tranquil would back / sponsor and pay for the hosting of such a web, but the content - we only have a small view of what is needed, and the solutions available.


    ..... welcoming any feedback.

  • Anonymous
    December 15, 2005
    Hello:

    XP Media Edition 2002

    I need immediate and critical response in resolving a FrontPage 2000 Server Extension / IIS Details.

    I just purchased an PC that doesn't recognize FrontPage 2000 Server Extensions. IIS v5 can't install the extensions noting unable to locate Personal Web Server, and that Windows 2000 OS and greater can't install 2000 extensions.

    If I attempt to download 2002 Server extension I received a message noting the IIS 4+ and greater need to be installed, and I'm already running IIS v5.

    I need to install Visual Studio .NET 2003 and will not install without the extensions. My class ends this week and this is CRITICAL.

    2nd inquiry relates to whether XP Media Edition supports dual OSs?


    Thank you and have a Blessed & Peaceful Day!

  • Anonymous
    December 21, 2005
    I'm at wits end trying to successfully install (or uninstall!) .NET Framework 2.0. No matter what I do, it always hangs at "Registering System.EnterpriseServices.dll." I've tried everything that looks applicable from this site, including all the steps here:

    http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/archive/2005/04/16/408856.aspx

    There's no problem with administrative permissions, which looks like the only case resembling what I'm getting. Is there any hope?

  • Anonymous
    January 13, 2006
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 05, 2006
    I would like to see an introduction and troubleshooting article on 'Shim database'-caching. I have read that this is caching of registry, and this technolgy is/becomes important in Vista and .net2.0.
    I came across your blog when I was googling on 'Unable to open shim database version registry key'. One of the advises referred to as yours, was to give user (supposedly write/set value) permissions to HKLMSoftwareMicrosoft.NETFrameworkPolicyAppPatchv2.0.50727.00000. Before I do a thing like that, I would like to know the risk involved.
    My apologies for any mispellings or bad grammar. English is, by far, my native language.

  • Anonymous
    March 06, 2006
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 16, 2006
    I have had an issue for some time with Media Center 2005 UR2 and an AverMedia A180 tuner not working with the onboard SATA controller of my machine. It is some kind of hardware/driver issue because my ATI HDTV Wonder works fine. AverMedia has not gotten me any solutions, and newer drivers don't seem to fix anything. There is a post about it here http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=597238 If there is anything someone smarter than I could do as far as at least looking at or reproducing this problem it would be great. An explanation would at least be nice if there is no fix.

  • Anonymous
    March 19, 2006
    Perhaps talk about whether or not there will be "Softsled" in Vista.  Information is hard to come by.

  • Anonymous
    April 29, 2006
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    May 01, 2006
    Hi Walter - I haven't tried this myself, but because Media Center does not allow domain joining, I don't think you will be able to get IIS configured and running, so dual boot is probably your best bet here.  Setting up a dual-boot system with Media Center and some other version of Windows is not any different than setting up dual-boot for any other 2 OS types.  There are some really good instructions for configuring the Media Center OS at http://blog.retrosight.com/PermaLink,guid,f2553662-641c-43a5-a9f8-fdd3d69b1dee.aspx that I think will be useful to you here.

  • Anonymous
    May 12, 2006
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    May 19, 2006
    hello,
    i am getting error when i run vs2005 beta 180 days...the error is:

    the application data forlder for visual studio could not be created..
    plz help me

  • Anonymous
    May 25, 2006
    Hi Shahid - This error means that the folder %APPDATA%MicrosoftVisualStudio8.0 could not be created.  There is probably some kind of permission problem for that folder.  Can you please try to create this folder manually using Windows Explorer and see if it works for you?

  • Anonymous
    June 07, 2006
    Hello Aaron,

    Let me thank you for writing such an insightful blog.

    Since you cover my two main interests (Visual Studio and Media Center) I hope I can coax you into answering me the following:
    I'm desperately trying to get Media Center TV to get a signal from a video source (eg. VCR or gaming console) to my TV card from the (S-)video-in connctor. Not the tuner.
    The MCE Newsgroup tell me, it can't be done with the current MCE features, as MCE only controls the tuner.

    Can an add-in provide MCE the ability to get a video from the video-in of one of my cards? My nVidia 6600 GT features a video-in as well as my Hauppauge WinTV Nova S+.

    Is the Media Center SDK a good tool for this problem? Can it be used with the Express versions of Visual Studio?

  • Anonymous
    June 13, 2006
    Hi Arminator - From what I know, getting video signals from non-TV sources is not supported in Media Center.  If you know enough about how to write code that could receive input from an alternative video source, you should be able to wrap that as a Media Center add-in.  The Media Center SDK can help you figure out how to integrate your application into Media Center.  The current version of Media Center (Update Rollup 2 for Media Center 2005) runs on the .NET Framework 1.1, so you will need to use Visual Studio .NET 2003 to create an add-in that will work correctly with Media Center.  The Express Editions can be used to create Media Center add-ins for Windows Vista.

  • Anonymous
    June 27, 2006
    Aaron,

    Hi I ran into an issue with winfx beta 2 and the add-ins for vs 2005. For some reason the add-ins try to convert my older sln files to 9.0 files. You cannot cancel the operation and still work with the old project. Now I am forced to remove vs 2005 and winfx beta 2. The uninstall for vs 2005 breaks because it cannot determine the unistall order. Can write about the manual uninstall. Also I have looked on the forums and cannot find a good place to post the issue. I left one message in the "Cider" forum to no avail. Is there a way to get the converter to stop converting projects. Otherwise I have to wait until november or january to work with winfx.

    thanks

  • Anonymous
    June 30, 2006
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    July 05, 2006
    When trying to open media center it immediately gives ehshell.exe application error 0XC0000005 message and closes the media center windows. Tried reconfguring media center but no go. Request you to provide your valuable suggestions in this regard.
    Thanks
    Rayaprolu

  • Anonymous
    July 05, 2006
    Hi Rayaprolu - The log file %windir%ehomeehshell.crash should provide more details about why this crash is happening.  Depending on what that says, there are different options for how to try to resolve this issue.

    What kind of reconfiguration have you tried already?  Also, what version of Media Center are you running, and what is the latest Media Center hotfix that you installed?

  • Anonymous
    July 05, 2006
    Hi Astebner
    The version of Media center is Media Center 2005. I am not sure about the latest hotfix donloaded on the system. I performed the following steps to resolve the issue but did not succeed.
    REGEDIT > hkey_current_user > software > software > windows > currentversion > Media Center > settings
    delete settings folder.
    hkey_local_machine > software > microsoft > windows > currentversion > media center > settings
    delete settings folder
    deleted Ehshell.config file from Ehome folder

  • Anonymous
    July 05, 2006
    Hi Rayaprolu - Deleting those settings registry hives/folders generally do not help resolve Media Center crashes (at least in my previous experience).  The log files %windir%ehomeehshell.crash and %windir%medctroc.log can be helpful to try to narrow this type of issue down.  You can send them to me at Aaron.Stebner (at) microsoft (dot) com and I will try to take a look and see if I can figure anything out.

  • Anonymous
    July 12, 2006
    Hi Dhubbard - You can use the steps at http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/archive/2005/10/30/487096.aspx to perform a manual uninstall of the various pieces of Visual Studio 2005.  Hopefully this helps solve the "unable to determine valid ordering" issue you have been experiencing.

  • Anonymous
    July 29, 2006
    My Media Center keeps crashing when I try to
    open albums and album cover jpgs.  The
    error says I don't have ntdll.dll but I ran
    a check on my system and I do....I really
    do.  I have tried to Point the Media Center
    to the other ntdl's but it is stubborn and
    will not give up that easily.

    My question is why can't a simple person, or
    simpleton like myself, just go and get some
    dll's and put them where they have gone MIA.
    The error messages tell me where the MIA file is missing from, and it seems only logical that
    you could just replace that dll.

    Anyway, thanx for listening and maybe your
    readers have a solution.

    M

  • Anonymous
    August 02, 2006
    Hi Mstuffed - I'm not sure how to explain why this is happening on your system.  Are you able to view your albums and album art in Windows Media Player?  Or does this error only happen in Windows Media Center?  You may want to try to repair Windows XP SP2 on your system and see if that helps here.  I'm sorry I'm not sure what else to suggest.

  • Anonymous
    August 08, 2006
    I am trying to install .net 2.0 and i recieve the following error Unexpected error 2352 when installing .net2.0 i have ran your cleanup utility to remove all remaining items from .net 1.0 and 1.1 and i still recieve this error, i have googled it and have found nothing, but i have been tearing through your site and the .net cleanup utility is fantastic it has worked with other issues i have run  into if there is more information you would like me to add please let me know and i can answer any of the questions

  • Anonymous
    August 09, 2006
    Hi KJRichmond - This error message sometimes can be caused by the file %windir%system32cabinet.dll being missing or corrupted.  You might want to try to repair the latest OS service pack on your system or copy it from %windir%system32dllcache to %windir%system32 and then try to install the .NET Framework 2.0 again and see if that helps here.

  • Anonymous
    August 29, 2006
    I'd like to see the .NET 2.0 Deployment Guide updated with ASP.NET information such as selecting specific IIS web sites during installation; configuring COM+ app pools; configuring a virtual directory for .NET 2.0; and SQL Server 2005 database deployment.

  • Anonymous
    August 30, 2006
    Hey can you help me in solving this case?I am having large .vhd files (bigger than 3 GB upto 9 GB) and I have to create installer using DVD..How to do create multi CD/DVD installer using wix when individual files are greater than 8 GB ?How to use media tag ? if any example posted, would be helpful..Thx

  • Anonymous
    September 09, 2006
    I have just decided to take the plunge and start using Vista Media Center. I have a Nova-T-500 Digital Dual TV tuner card that I have tested before under XP2 using Hauppauge WinTV2000 without any issue whatsoever. My experience with Vista is somewhat disappointing so far. I am completely unable to get any TV signal and the EPG does not work. I have to say that I live in Espoo (Finland). Could you please help?

  • Anonymous
    September 10, 2006
    Hi Kananga Boy - You may want to try to update your TV tuner drivers and see if that helps resolve this issue.  I would suggest checking first on Windows Update, and if that doesn't help, check on the website for your tuner card manufacturer.  If these do not help, I suggest posting a question on the Windows Media Center for Windows Vista beta newsgroups and look for further advice there.

  • Anonymous
    September 20, 2006
    Aaron,

    while trying to upgrade a SharePoint 2007 development VM I 'm stuck with the problem that the VS extensions for WFX and for WWF need build 4203.2 aka .Net 3.0 RC and don't accept the published build 4307 also called .Net 3.0 RC.
    Can you try to clarify and perhaps propose a workaround please?

    Thanks,
    Thomas

  • Anonymous
    October 03, 2006
    I have seen VS 2005 setup..and it look quite nice..I wanted to know what is the authoring tool used to develop this setup..I think it's Wise ..can WIX create same kind of installer?

  • Anonymous
    October 04, 2006
    Hi Vikas_aditya - Visual Studio setup is a chainer written in C++ that installs multiple MSIs behind the scenes.  MSIs themselves can be built using WiX, but the chaining of multiple MSIs requires a separate tool.  There is not currently a chainer that is part of WiX, so you will have to find another technology such as the Visual Studio bootstrapper tool or write your own chainer executable.

  • Anonymous
    November 19, 2006
    Unable to connect. This network topology worked in MCE2005. Did an upgrade to Vista Ultimate. I am able to use the Media Manager of Xbox 360 to connect via (Windows Connect / WMP 11). When I setup the extender, it fails, during "Setting Extender cofiguration settings" and XBOX 360 times out - saying unable to connect. Also, how I clean up any old extender settings or remove old extenders ? Please help

  • Anonymous
    November 20, 2006
    Hi Mediabuff - I don't have a lot of expertise in troubleshooting Xbox 360 connectivity in Windows Vista Media Center, so I would suggest posting a question to the Microsoft.Public.Windows.MediaCenter newsgroup and hopefully someone there will be able to help out. I believe you can remove old extenders by going to the System tab in the Xbox 360 dashboard, choosing Computers, then Windows Media Center and choosing Disconnect.

  • Anonymous
    February 12, 2007
    I create plugins for a living, some of which rely on external third-party DLLs. Installation has always been an issue, since the host application can't find my external DLLs unless they are in the host application's directory, or in system32. I've been lead to believe (why, I'm not sure, since I haven't found ANY information on doing this) that I need to create an "assembly", by creating a "manifest" that points to my external DLLs. This should theoretically allow me to put my dependencies alongside my main plugin DLL without scattering my files every which way. Is this possible? If so, can you write on this or other techniques on achieving something like this?

  • Anonymous
    February 26, 2007
    Can you perhaps elaborate on some of the registry settings used by Vista media center. I experienced stuttering in vista media center with a Terratec Cinergy 2400i DVB-T tuner (with >90% signal strength) until I tweaked some of the DVR settings as follows My latest settings are [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionMedia CenterServiceVideoTunersDVR] "AsyncIoBufferSizeBytes"=dword:00080000 "AsyncIoWriterBufferPoolCount"=dword:00000028 "BufferPoolTotalMillis"=dword:00000bb8 "BufferPoolSize"=dword:00000200 "AsyncIoReaderBufferPoolCount"=dword:0000005a "BufferPoolMaxPerStream"=dword:00000300 This was somewhat of an educated guess - I'm theorising that the I/O between the card and MCE/disk needs some more capacity esp when system is busy (3gb ram, Pentium D 820 dual core, 2 disk striped for MCE in a Dell PC) . A vendor supplied TV recording prog has no stutter whatsoever. I'm still thinking I need to retweak these slightly, but am I working along the right lines? I think there's quite a number of people out there with this issue. Note: since I have 3Gb of ram I'm not bothered about using significant (250Mb?) ram for MCE.

  • Anonymous
    May 09, 2007
    Hi, can you tell me how to restore ACL permissions which i backed up already to a file using subinacl /outputlog="outputfile.log". I read it in a manual /play file option is used to restore the ACL permissions. but when i try this option it resore nothing. i.e., there is no users and groups in ACL list and we have to create it manually. im wondering is there any option used along with /playfile?. or is there any way to restore these acl permissions from the output file?

  • Anonymous
    May 09, 2007
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    May 31, 2007
    I'm using my xBox360 as a Media Center extender. Unfortunately, the Media Center remote is controlling both the TV and the PC at the same time. This has the undesired effect of running random commands on my computer when all I want to do is watch TV. Is there a way to disable the remote from controlling the PC?

  • Anonymous
    May 31, 2007
    Hi Sanchst - Yes, this is a setting you can control in your Xbox Dashboard.  I forget exactly where it is, but I believe it is on the system tab.  There is a remote control menu that looks like the picture in the blog post at http://mediacenter.mattgoyer.com/archives/2006/06/06/1130 and you can toggle your remote to only work with the Xbox 360 and not with Media Center on your PC.

  • Anonymous
    June 14, 2007
    After installing Office 2003 about 2 weeks after installing a fresh copy of Vista Home Premium, Media Center suddenly stopped recognising my TV Tuner which was working beautifully up until that point. Plus, around the same time I started noticing weird graphical glitches in the text in Vista games like Minesweeper and Solitaire. I did a System Restore back to the point just before installing Office and the Media Center error message changed from "No TV Tuner detected" to "a required file is missing or corrupt" (or something to that effect). This suggests to me that Office overwrote a system file with its own (older) version, causing the TV tuner to stop working, but when I got rid of  Office, the file wasn't replaced with the original. I also tried running the Vista Startup Repair utility to see if it could repair any system files that had been corrupted but it didn't detect any problems. I have the latest drivers for both my TV Tuner and my graphics card installed. Any clues?

  • Anonymous
    June 15, 2007
    Hi Jono1 - Windows Vista includes a feature called Windows Resource Protection that will prevent applications from being able to replace system files, so I don't think that Office would have corrupted anything on your system to cause this type of error in Media Center. I'd suggest trying the suggestions listed by me and by other folks in the comments of the post at http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/archive/2007/03/16/how-to-repair-media-center-files-and-registry-entries-on-windows-vista.aspx to see if they help at all in this scenario.

  • Anonymous
    June 20, 2007
    Hi there You write about how developers can fix the nightmares surrounding the Visual C++ runtime DLL's. The VC runtime DLL's are relied upon by millions of applications and yet there are versions with serious bugs in them. See: http://www.google.co.za/search?hl=en&safe=off&q=%22This+application+has+requested+the+Runtime+to+terminate+it+in+an+unusual+way.%22&btnG=Search&meta= There are thousands of entries relating to this bug. Microsoft does not seem to want to propose a resolution to this problem. We are told to contact Microsoft Professional Services.

  • Anonymous
    June 27, 2007
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    September 03, 2007
    Wer weiss wann Office Live in der Schweiz eingeführt wird? Als KMU wäre das natürlich extrem interessant zu wissen....

  • Anonymous
    December 04, 2007
    I'd like to create an .msi installer using Visual Studio 9 that will install the 3.5 .net framework wo asking the user to go to the web and then install my application. So the user downloads my msi and from then on out all they have to do is click next and accept licensing agreements. I don't mind if the installer is a bootstrapper and downloads stuff from the web -- just so long as the user doesn't have to intercede to start the downloads. And what would really be great is a codeplex project to do this. I can't help but think that this is a very common and vanilla scenario (and hope!) of third party developers. It would be a very interesting exercise for MS to undertake to see how easydifficult it is for 3ed parties to create such an .msi. Thanks! Chris

  • Anonymous
    August 31, 2008
    I get a error (YOUR COMPUTER DOES NOT HAVE TUNER HARDWARE INSTALLED THAT SUPPORT FM RADIO) Please help.

  • Anonymous
    August 31, 2008
    Hi Lavoe1 - There are some suggestions for TV Tuner installation/configuration errors in the links at http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/articles/487537.aspx. If none of those help, then I'd suggest posting a question on one of the following forums to see if someone there can suggest some additional options for you: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/newsgroups/reader.mspx?dg=microsoft.public.windows.mediacenter http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/83/ShowForum.aspx Hopefully one of these helps.

  • Anonymous
    November 28, 2008
    I followed your process for removing .NET Framework 1.1, using your removal tool and reloading it, along with the updates. It still crashes after I have browsed through movie titles for a while. I always get the same error: Application has generated an exception that could not be handled Process id=0x10d0 (4304), Thread id=0x1434 (5172)

  • Anonymous
    November 29, 2008
    Hi Pmb72 - There might be more detailed information about the cause of this crash in the file named c:windowsehomeehshell.crash and/or in the event logs on the system.  I'd suggest looking there to see if there is any helpful information. It might also help to post a question at one of the following locations to see if anyone there can help suggest any additional workarounds for you: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/newsgroups/reader.mspx?dg=microsoft.public.windows.mediacenter http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/83/ShowForum.aspx

  • Anonymous
    January 05, 2009
    Hi, I was wondering if you could update the .NET 3.5 installation guide to include .NET 3.5 SP1. I have tried to follow a similar process to create the administrative share, but with 3.5 SP1 it fails to install.

  • Anonymous
    January 06, 2009
    Hi Mushimushi - Thank you for the suggestion.  There are steps to create an administrative install point for the .NET Framework 3.5 at http://msdn2.microsoft.com/library/cc160717.aspx, and the steps should be nearly identical for the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. Could you provide more detail about your scenario?  What steps were you using when you tried to create your administrative install point, and what error did you see during installation?

  • Anonymous
    February 08, 2009
     I have 2 people that I am helping attempt to install ".NET Framework 3.5 Family Update (KB951847)" which is being presented by Windows Update.  I have removed all instances of .Net and reinstalled all and still the update won't install.  The two errors I've seen are 0x80070643 and 0x80070645.    I know that this is a blog and not a forum. I thought that if you have heard of this problem from anyone else it may warrant an update to a current blog or a new one altogether.  If these are isolated incidents  then I may just have to reinstall the OS and try again (OS is XP sp3.. fyi).  Thanks for all the time and effort you put into your site. It has helped a lot of people.

  • Anonymous
    February 08, 2009
    Hi Nelsontrek - The 643 and 645 error codes from Windows Update are generic errors that mean that something went wrong during the installation.  When that type of error happens, you typically will have to look at the verbose logs for the product that is failing to install in order to narrow down the cause.  For the .NET Framework 3.5, you can find a list of setup log files at http://blogs.msdn.com/astebner/archive/2008/04/30/8445569.aspx.  If you can zip and upload your files to a file server and then post a link to the server location back here, I can try to take a look and see if I can figure out what is causing the installer to fail on these systems. If there are common root causes, I can also create a new blog post about them in the future.

  • Anonymous
    February 09, 2009
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 22, 2009
    Hi Aaron, I am looking for an option to upgrade x86 package to x64. After deploying x86 binaries, what options do I have to upgrade these binaries to x64? Please help! Thanks in advance, Ronith

  • Anonymous
    March 23, 2009
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2009
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    June 09, 2009
    Hi Xhaman - I don't have a lot of expertise in this scenario.  I'd suggest posting this question on the Windows Media Center development forums at http://discuss.mediacentersandbox.com.  Hopefully some of the experts there will be able to help suggest some options for you to try.

  • Anonymous
    June 10, 2009
    Aaron, do you have any experience enabling custom actions to consume properties that are defined or set within the context of a merge module? For example, we've been using SIDLookup  (http://www.installsite.org/pages/en/msi/tips.htm#SIDLookup) in our wix msi projects to populate a bunch of properties with the friendly names of well known accounts (sids) in a localized installation.  However, when we try to consume the custom action in a merge module project the property(s) that are defined by the merge module are inconsistent with the properties set by the custom action due to the merge module appending it's id to the property name at compile time.  So the custom action will not work.  I have to hard-code the id into the source of the custom action to force consistency of the property names so that the correct property will be populated at install time and consumed by the LockPermisions table. The base problem that prompted this question involves trying to set folder permisissions for the USERS group in a localized installation from within the context of a merge module project.  

  • Anonymous
    June 19, 2009
    Hi Wicampbell - I'm sorry, but I don't have experience with this type of scenario.  It might help to ask about this on the WiX users group (http://wix.sourceforge.net/mailinglists.html#wix-users) and/or the Windows Installer public newsgroup to get some suggestions for how best to configure things in this type of scenario.

  • Anonymous
    August 19, 2009
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    September 08, 2009
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 10, 2011
    How about an Iplayer for Xbox or other catch up TV services.

  • Anonymous
    March 22, 2011
    Hi Aaron, I'm stuck.  My main server in the office is refusing to install any .NET updates/fixes/patches.  I have run your netfx_setupverifier and it successfully checks whatever is installed on the system: .NET 1.1 SP1, .NET 2 SP2, .NET 3 SP1, and .NET 3.5.  Any attempts to update them fail, whether using Microsoft Update or direct installation.  I did some extensive reading on the subject but so far don't know which way to go.  Would be able to help me?   Peter

  • Anonymous
    March 23, 2011
    Hi PMZ01 - What I usually suggest in this type of scenario is to uninstall the versions of the .NET Framework that are on your computer, re-install them, and try again to apply the .NET Framework updates that are available on Windows Update.  You can find a set of steps and a tool to help you do this at blogs.msdn.com/.../8108332.aspx.

  • Anonymous
    March 28, 2011
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    March 28, 2011
    Hi PMZ01 - Uninstalling the .NET Framework could affect the functionality of your server, but that is why I suggested re-installing it afterwards.   If this is a production server, you'll need to be careful and schedule some downtime while you do this because there are likely to be things that do not work correctly in between the time that you uninstall and the time that you re-install.

  • Anonymous
    May 15, 2012
    Hi Aaron, I'd love to see a topic on how to create unattended network installations for Visual Studio 2008 and 2010 express which don't require a network file share, but instead work against a local (internal) HTTP server.

  • Anonymous
    May 15, 2012
    Hi Chad - I don't believe that Visual Studio setup supports that type of scenario.  You might want to ask on the Visual Studio setup forums just in case though - social.msdn.microsoft.com/.../threads.

  • Anonymous
    July 17, 2012
    Hello Aaron, There is very little information about any custom action testing framework we could use in MSI's. Can you once talk about it in one of your blog posts? I would be interested in Lux Regards, Kiran Hegde

  • Anonymous
    July 18, 2012
    Hi Kiran Hegde - I don't have any personal experience using Lux or with unit testing custom actions.  There is some information about how to use Lux in the WiX documentation at wix.sourceforge.net/.../lux.htm and wix.sourceforge.net/.../lux_xsd_index.htm, so hopefully that'll help you get started.

  • Anonymous
    April 21, 2015
    The comment has been removed

  • Anonymous
    April 22, 2015
    Hi Mike Trodd - I've posted a reply to your forum post, and I also replied to the blog comment about this issue that you posted at blogs.msdn.com/.../491653.aspx.  Hopefully this helps.