I've built and deployed an Outlook 2016 VSTO plugin and built an installer for it using the following walkthrough - https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc442767.aspx. The installer has been compiled for x86 and x64 architectures (two separate installs).
However, I'm seeing a variety of different issues when I install in different environments.
In a Windows 7 (x64, Office x32), the plugin loads as expected and works perfectly.
In a Windows 7 (x64, Office x64), the plugin installs, the LoadBehavior is correct, the plugin is loaded in Outlook but it is never displayed? I have tried to disable all other add-ins and still it doesn't show up?
I have tried using the suppressed alerts - How to troubleshoot a VSTO addin that does not load? - but this has not yielded any useful information at this moment.
Some of these peculiarities extend into Windows 10 itself.
What I'm trying to ascertain is why some environments the plugin goes in smoothly and in others why it fails or worst, faults. Are there other keys I need to look at?
Thanks
There are a lot of pitfalls why you may not see the plug-in in Office applications.
The very first option I'd suggest checking - UI errors. By default, if an VSTO Add-in attempts to manipulate the Microsoft Office user interface (UI) and fails, no error message is displayed. However, you can configure Microsoft Office applications to display messages for errors that relate to the UI. You can use these messages to help determine why a custom Ribbon does not appear, or why a Ribbon appears but no controls appear. See How to: Show Add-in User Interface Errors for more information.
Second, make sure that you included all the required prerequisites to the installer. Sometimes the plug-in can't run correclty because any of the dependencies is missed. Or you just use platform-specific assemblies...
Third, make sure no exceptions are fired at startup.
Below you may find some helpful articles:
Troubleshooting COM Add-In load failures
Resolving performance issues with loading Office add-ins (VSTO add-ins or Shared add-ins)
Thanks for the info - the end result issue ended being a combination of registry keys being deployed to the wrong location for x64 platforms on an x86 Office install.
The solution was to cover my bases with both registry hives to ensure things loaded as expected.
Related
We have a custom Outlook VSTO add-in. We publish to a location which installs based on version, and it has worked perfectly for years. For some reason, the new version we pushed today is not running properly. It installs fine, it appears to be running (i.e. shows in the list of Add-Ins, has delays ignored, and shows as active) but the icon that should show up in the ribbon for a meeting is not appearing. It does work on the developer machines. No errors are logged anywhere, including Application Event Viewer. The install package does seem considerably larger, but there are no massive upgrades, and the machines with the issues have .Net 4.8 as do the development machines.
but the icon that should show up in the ribbon for a meeting is not appearing
By default, if a VSTO add-in attempts to manipulate the Microsoft Office user interface (UI) and fails, no error message is displayed. However, you can configure Microsoft Office applications to display messages for errors that relate to the UI. You can use these messages to help determine why a custom ribbon does not appear, or why a ribbon appears but no controls appear. See How to: Show Add-in user interface errors for more information.
Also you need to make sure that images are available on the end user machine.
I have notice this error happens for ALL modern Outlook Office Add-ins. Searching the net I can also see that many other Modern Outlook Add-ins are having the same issue. We know that this is an Outlook Client issue. You never get the error on OWA.
I have also seen that Microsoft are suggesting
Open Internet Explorer
Click Tools
Click Internet Options
Click Security tab
Select Internet Sites zone
Select Enable Protected Mode (make sure box is un checked)
Click OK
Restart Internet Explorer and Outlook
However, we cannot ask customer to do this. Many are not even using IE. And it doesn't work most of the times!
In our case the Add-in service is running on Azure. We have enabled application insight and are monitoring failures on a daily basis. Our service is running on 20% of the avilable capacity. I feel that we have done all that we could. We are stock! and very frustrated.
Logically, when the Add-in works with no error in OWA, and only fails in the Outlook client this can only mean the error is in Outlook or windows or.... meaning it is a Microsoft error.
This error is by-design for add-ins in Outlook clients that are rendered using IE and do not have Protected Mode enabled. Protected Mode is a security feature when using IE, and it is strongly recommend that it be enabled while using add-ins.
If you do not or cannot enable Protected Mode, a possible workaround is to upgrade to a newer Windows and Office, so add-ins are rendered using Edge Webview instead of IE. Details about what versions that Webview are supported can be found here.
I have written a VSTO for Outlook with a formregion for meeting/appointmentitems in VS 2015.
I deploy this to our desktop computers using ClickOnce.
I would like to use the Windows Installer to install the VSTO for laptops because when I use ClickOnce and the laptop uses Outlook when not connected to the corporate network, the add-in is disabled.
I assume this is because it cannot reach the internal ClickOnce publish location, eventhough the deployment should not check for updates.
I have followed this article to create an installer for the addin.
I followed the all-users steps and the files are installed to the local computer and the registry keys are being created but the Add-in is not loaded in Outlook and it even is not showing up in the list of Addins in Outlook.
Anyone who has had similar issues and knows how to solve this problem? It's driving me crazy for the past 2 days.
There is no such central repository. Your addin most likely gets disabled on startup because of a run-time error.
The solution is very simple but impossible.
I have office 2010 and office 2012 installed, VB6 fails to create a Word application object giving me no more than just a message saying that the DLL is not registered.
All attempts to remove and restore the DLL using the installer or third party DLL fails.
After removing everything office related and only installing office 2010, the application object gets created successfully. But this is not a viable solutions for our customers: we can't have them removing their Office suites for this.
Is there any other way?
I had a similar issue on my dev machine with two versions of office. Cast your eye over this article from Microsoft support they mention the /regserver command line option. The article is Office automation when multiple versions of Office are installed. By the looks of it I don't think you can force it to pick one version or the other but the /regserver will help you in your dev environment.
We developed an Outlook Add-In for Win 7 with SP1 and .NET Framework 4.0 as a prerequisite. It gets install perfectly on some machine without any hiccup but in other machines (same configuration, Win 7 & SP1) the add-in goes into the 'inactive' state and doesnt load while outlook start-up.
While installing there are no issues or error message getting displayed. What could be the problem? How can I check or debug what could be causing this issue? Any solution or hints on this will be highly appreaciated.
Inactive add-ins are usually caused by a missing reference that wasn't deployed. Try some of these resources:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/haahmadi/archive/2010/05/26/my-vsto-add-in-does-not-load.aspx
http://archive.msdn.microsoft.com/vstotroubleshooter