Zsolt Kollarits
Posts: 340
Joined: Fri May 29, 2015 10:36 am

Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Fri Feb 23, 2018 3:13 pm

Dear Advanced Installer Support Team,

Let me report a very strange problem for you, unfortunately this is extremely important for one of our customers, so we need to figure out a solution for them no later than next week. Their issue is the following: they would like to make a default feature to be removed from our product during an upgrade performed by your Advanced Updater (update config file) feature.

Note: We started to use your Advanced Updater feature long time ago, we give proper update config files for all of our customers. The standard files we give are correct since many customers are using it already.

The problem started to happen after we modified our Update Config .aip project and added the following text into the "Command line" field:
REMOVE=TheSolutionDesigner
I´ll send you our .aip project via an email.

If we gave the refreshed update config file for our customer and he fed Advanced Updated with that file, the update process started as usual, apparently it did some progress too, cause it took some time until they got the following error:
Error: Update installation failed
I´ll send you a screenshot image about this as well.

We confirmed that having that defining the CommandLine in the update config .aip project and generating such a file cannot be fed to Advanced Updater feature, because the installation will be unsuccessful every time. Without having "REMOVE=TheSolutionDesigner" in Command Line field, the update would go just fine.

Now comes the most important part: Although you dialog showed the given error, the installation logfile does not contain any error. We saw a lot of installation logs already, and this one seemed to be a log where no error occured. We see the following lines at the end of the file:

MSI (s) (6C:9C) [13:41:14:774]: Product: PRODUCT_NAME -- Installation completed successfully.
MSI (s) (6C:9C) [13:41:14:774]: Windows Installer installed the product. Product Name: PRODUCT_NAME . Product Version: 17.3.1. Product Language: 1033. Manufacturer: XY Corporation. Installation success or error status: 0.

Anyway, I'm sending you the logfile too in the email. It says the installation was complete, but we still see the old version of our procut in Control Panel -> Programs and Features dialog. Somehow the new product was not installed on the PC or else it was rolled back.

I hope we can find a solution quickly. Sorry for the long letter, as you can see the issue is really complex.

Best regards,
Zsolt

Bogdan
Posts: 2791
Joined: Tue Jul 07, 2009 7:34 am
Contact:  Website

Re: Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Fri Feb 23, 2018 3:57 pm

Hi Zsolt,

Indeed, the command line you are passing in the updater is correctly passed to the installer, the updater is not at fault for the error.

You see the error in the updater dialog because you are incorrectly using the property REMOVE. Thus the detection criteria of the updater gives the error, because application has not installed.

When you set the property REMOVE Windows Installer automatically starts your MSI in maintenance/uninstall mode. (you can search your log for "current configuration is maintenance mode or an uninstall "to validate this).

The correct way to set from the command line which features are installed and which not is by using the property ADDLOCAL.

Regards,
Bogdan
Bogdan Mitrache - Advanced Installer Team
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Zsolt Kollarits
Posts: 340
Joined: Fri May 29, 2015 10:36 am

Re: Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Fri Feb 23, 2018 8:07 pm

Hi Bogdan,

Thank you for you very quick response, that´s really appreciated. It´s pretty bad that we can´t use REMOVE - based on what you described. With ADDLOCAL we can define a list of features that we would like to install or else we can set it to ALL. Our problem with this is we have approx 50 features and the customer installed approx. 30 features out of the 50 in his previous installation. Now after the upgrade he would like to exclude a single feature only, so that he expect 29 features after the upgrade. That´s the use case basically. Obviously using ADDLOCAL and listing 29 feature next to it looks pretty weird.

One more question from our side: How is it possible that executing the following command in Command Line does properly work:
TheClient.exe REMOVE=TheSolutionDesigner
When using REMOVE in Command Line, the update won´t containt TheSolutionDesigner. That´s exactly what the customer want, but they would like to do an automatic rollout on many clients using your Advanced Updater feature. That´s why we tried to modify the update config file for him.

Best regards,
Zsolt

Daniel
Posts: 8237
Joined: Mon Apr 02, 2012 1:11 pm
Contact:  Website

Re: Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Thu Mar 01, 2018 4:55 pm

Hello Zsolt,

I'm not so sure why the manual launch of the EXE setup with the REMOVE property set by command line works. Usually this shouldn't work in case of an upgrade. We will have to further troubleshoot and investigate this on our side. Can you please send us by email to support at advancedinstaller dot com the following resources:

1. the AIP (project file) of the old product version
2. the AIP (project file) of the new product version
3. tell us which one of the EXE setups do you launch with the REMOVE property set (the old or the new one)

All the best,
Daniel
Daniel Radu - Advanced Installer Team
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Zsolt Kollarits
Posts: 340
Joined: Fri May 29, 2015 10:36 am

Re: Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Fri Mar 02, 2018 1:29 pm

Hi Daniel,

I sent you the files via mail.

Best regards,
Zsolt

Eusebiu
Posts: 4931
Joined: Wed Nov 14, 2012 2:04 pm

Re: Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Wed Mar 07, 2018 11:47 am

Hi Zsolt,

Thank you for the resources you sent us via email.

We tested the upgrade scenario by sending the "REMOVE=TheSolutionDesigner" property through the Updater or through the Command Prompt with Full UI or in silent mode, but the files related to the specified feature were not removed in none of the cases mentioned above.

I'm afraid that this is the normal Windows Installer behavior, as my colleague Bogdan mentioned above, the installer performs a maintenance action when the "REMOVE" property is sent to it.

As a workaround, you can try the following approach: use a property as a condition in the "Disabled if" field of that feature and, during the upgrade, set that property so that feature will get disabled.

Let me know if this worked.

Best regards,
Eusebiu
Eusebiu Aria - Advanced Installer Team
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Zsolt Kollarits
Posts: 340
Joined: Fri May 29, 2015 10:36 am

Re: Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Wed Mar 07, 2018 12:03 pm

Hi Eusebiu,

In the meantime I´ve sent a .doc file to you as well gathering all the tests I performed recently.

For me "REMOVE=TheSolutionDesigner" works only if the installation is NOT silent, but it does not work with /qn. In Full-UI mode I was always managed to install the newer version of our product which also removed the given feature as expected.

Best regards,
Zsolt

Eusebiu
Posts: 4931
Joined: Wed Nov 14, 2012 2:04 pm

Re: Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Wed Mar 07, 2018 2:00 pm

Hi Zsolt,

I saw the document you sent to us and we tested the scenarios you described, but that feature was not removed in none of them for us. We also did many tests on new sample packages and the result was the same.

I'm not sure how it worked for you. Does it work if you test this on multiple clean machines?

Even if it works on some machines, it is not a safe approach, so it is not recommended. Please test the workaround I suggested you which should work for both UI and non-UI and can be easily implemented.

Best regards,
Eusebiu
Eusebiu Aria - Advanced Installer Team
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Zsolt Kollarits
Posts: 340
Joined: Fri May 29, 2015 10:36 am

Re: Update Config Project: CommandLine field is not working -> makes the installation unsuccessful

Tue Mar 13, 2018 2:20 pm

Hi Eusebiu,

Yes, we did all the tests on multiple clean machines, multiple times. You can see REMOVE always works (and really removes the feature in question) if the installation is not in silent mode, with other words if /qn is not present in the command. The problem occurs only if REMOVE and /qn are user together. We still don´t understand why REISNTALL and REINSTALLMODE properties can be used, but REMOVE can´t.

Best regards,
Zsolt

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