Uninstall failed - Custom Add-Remove entry is gone

[TheRocket]

Hello!

I'm noticing this issue in Advanced installer 17.6 and I will have to test it out in a recent version. I may need some advice on how to reproduce this:

You have a project which will create a "custom add-remove" entry in the control panel.
You install this project on the computer as usual.

While you uninstall another software, you try to remove your product as well. You end up with some entries and this error in the logs:

Code: Select all

Action start 10:08:28: VerifyRemoveDlg.      ////This looks like an uninstall
....

Action start 10:08:28: ProgressDlg.
.....

MSI (c) (2C:C4) [10:08:28:792]: PROPERTY CHANGE: Adding REMOVE property. Its value is 'ComponentA,ComponentB'.   /////all components are listed here

....

Action start 10:08:28: ExecuteAction.
MSI (c) (2C:C4) [10:08:28:961]: Note: 1: 1500 
MSI (c) (2C:C4) [10:08:33:105]: Product: MyAwesomeSetup -- Error 1500. Another installation is in progress. You must complete that installation before continuing this one.

and the logs ends with a user exit.

Many of the components are still present on the machine (Files, services, services control entries), but your IIS web sites and applications pools are removed, and also the custom add-remove entry is no longer in the registry. The "hidden" add-remove entry is still present in the registry. We are under the impression the product is no longer installed, but it is still installed.

I suspect that the install transaction was rollbacked, but some custom parts were not restored, or the custom parts removal continued even if the main process ended with the 1500 error.

I may have to create a project just to reproduce this issue in the version 17.6 and newer version and try to reproduce this. I think that may be a bug in the management of the custom actions and operations?

Thanks!

TheRocket

[Catalin]

Hello,

From what I can see, we are having here the classic Windows Installer limitation that prevents two installers running at the same time on the same machine.

Most likely, your setup is not uninstalled from the machine. However, if you have some custom actions that remove the IIS or anything else really, then these custom actions are not rolled back.

The only way to rollback a custom action is through another custom action (basically like an inverse custom action, e.g. one custom action adds a registry entry, the rollback one removes the said registry entry).

Hope this helps!

Best regards,
Catalin