Issue installing SQL Server 2008 Express as a dependency via ClickOnce - windows

I'm currently working on a project which has a Winforms component that is installed via ClickOnce. The original target OS was Vista and above and it continues to work fine for those platforms.
However, the customer has now requested that the application be tested against Windows XP (yes - I know it's about to have support dropped but what can I say).
When I run the installer against a fresh XP virtual machine ClickOnce duly installs the prequisites (Windows Installer 4.5 and SQL Server 2008 [with configured instance]) before installing the application itself.
Running the application appears to work as expected but when attempting to sync the local database with the remote one an exception is thrown.
"Could not load file or assembly 'Microsoft.SqlServer.Replication,
Version 10.0.0.0' or one of its dependencies"
Now, if I start again from a clean XP VM and Manually install Windows Installer and SQL Server Express 2008 before starting the ClickOnce package to install the main application the resulting installation works fine and without error!
I have tried numerous things including creating a ConfigurationFile.ini and using that for both manual and ClickOnce installations but the result is the same - the one with the manually installation of SQL Server will run without error but the ClickOnce installation will not.
I've pretty much run out of ideas now so hoping that someone can point me in the right direction.
Thanks in advance

Related

Remote Debugging code running on a Windows XP machine without Visual Studio installed

I want to remote debug an executable that is running on a Windows XP machine. This machine does not have Visual Studio installed. I am running Visual Studio .NET from another machine on the network. (I'm easily able to remotely debug other XP machines which have Visual Studio .NET installed).
I located the remote debugging tool (msvsmon.exe in this case) copied the folder to a local directory on the machine I wish to debug and ran it. The cmd window indicated that I was running "Visual C++ Remote Debug Monitor (x86) Version 7.00.96"
I attempt to select the machine from VS in order to attach to the process and I received an error:
Unable to connect to the machine . The debugger is not
properly installed. Run setup to install or repair the debugger.
As I'm not able to find debugging tools online that are old enough, I'm not sure how to proceed.
While there is still time, you should get a copy of VS2010 Service Patch 2, and install it, the version of msvsmon.exe in VS2010 is the LAST release which supports XP remote debugging. In my work we develop for XP Embedded, and have a large installed base used in manufacturing globally. Our customers would scream bloody murder if we changed the runtime which would break/damage/shutdown manufacturing. So we are now forced to migrate to VS2019 and yet we build for XP clients. Our new products do run newer Windows Embedded versions, but the legacy products are still in demand, and are XP embedded based. There is no remote debug capability to my knowledge with VS2019, and our firm is not allowed to distribute VS2010 to our clients so they can single step debug. Very frustrating.

Deployment error in WIndows XP [ERROR: SQL Server Database is not installed or not running]

I have developed a POS System Recently and workin on its deployment.
Application Specifications:
The application is basically a POS system.
Back end = SQL Server 2008 Express R2.
Front End = C#
I also used SMO libraries.
Deployment Method = Click-once.
Target Framework = 4.0.
Development Tool = Visual Studio 2012 RC.
OS = Windows 7 Home Premium.
Used some SQL feature packs like Shared management Objects, CLR types. and others.
The prerequisites are selected and i packaged them also.
In brand new windows 7 the installation was fine. and application is running upto date.
In win XP the installation is fine. but when i start the app. it colses with this error.
SQL Server database is not installed and or not running.
and application quits.
IMPORTNAT NOTE:
THE 'WINDOWS XP SP3 PROFESSIONAL'
ON WHICH I AM TESTING IS INSTALLED ON VIRTUAL MACHINE
In the code i am running some SMO library functions in order to install *.sql script for the application's first time use.
SQL Server 2008 R2 is installed with all of its dependencies. and other feature packs. All the prerequisites are installed on XP.
Can you run SQLServer Management Studio on the XP VM and see SQLServer? If you run the SQLServer Configuration Manager on the VM, and click on SQL Server Services, does it show the service is running?
How do you have the connections configured? Do you have named pipes and TCP/IP enabled for the SQLServer Network configuration? What about the SQL Native Client configuration?
Do you have SQLServer Express ticked as a prerequisite in the ClickOnce deployment? What happens if you run setup.exe? Does it recognize that it's installed?
The SQLServer Express that's installed -- is it a named instance, or did you leave it as ".\SQLExpress" ? Id the connection string being used by the ClickOnce application right?

windows service msi installer created in vs2003 hangs in win7 while installing

We have few windows services developed using .Net framework 1.1(VS2003).For each windows service an msi installer(set up project) is created to make installation easier.These installers are able to install windows services successfully in windows XP.But these installers unable to install windows service in WIN7 though I have admin privileges on the machine in which I am trying install them.While I am trying to install the windows service in win7, Through msi installer,installation is progressing till 90%.After that it is neither completing nor throwing an error.I am unable to understand what the problem is.
I tried following ways.
1.Opened cmd window in admin mode and tried to execute the msi with the command msiexec -i --Din't work
2.Right clicked on the actual exe(windows service exe) file and tried to run it in admin mode.--Din't work
3.Changed the UAC to never notify, restarted the machine and then tried to install--Din't work
4.Right clicked on both exe and msi and open their properties and changed the compatibility to lower version of windows and tried to install--Din't work
One thing I have noticed is that for all the custom actions of our windows service installer, primary output of our main project(exe) was given as input.I build the msi installer by removing all the custom actions.Then i tried to install it in win7.Then it was installed.But during the installation system not prompted for account details (which is the actual case while installing windows service) and also the service was not appeared in services manager window.
I spent somuch time to identify the cause and resolution.But I dint find any posts on this issue.I suspect that the problem is with custom actions.But not sure.If the problem is with custom actions please let me know how to overcome it.
Please provide a resolution for this issue or share me if there are any links which talks about this.
FWIW, .NET 1.1 isn't supported on Win7. Also I'm guessing you are using InstallUtil custom actions to drive the setup of your .NET Windows Service. These are very fragile and you can eliminate all those brittle points by refactoring and using the ServiceInstall ServiceControl tables in MSI.

Deploying Datasnap Service

Using C++ Builder under Rad Studio XE I have created a simple Datasnap server service from scratch. I wanted to test the service installation process before adding any functionality, and found that while it will install successfully on a range of Windows machines, I haven't been able to get it to Start under a clean installation of Windows 7 x64.
The error message trying to start the service is: Windows could not start the service on Local Computer. Error 2: The system cannot find the specified file.
I have turned off both dynamic linking and run-time libraries. It starts fine under Windows XP and 2003 operating systems, just not this single Win7 machine that I have. I have opened the firewall for the specified ports, and confirmed no other app is using them as well. The service was installed under Administrator, and logs on as Local System account.
Is there a problem with a C++ Builder compiled service under Windows 7, or maybe 64 bit? Hopefully someone can point me in the right direction so I don't have to bang my head against the wall too many more time.
Thanks!
Since C++ Builder creates 32bit applications only, make sure you install the service in the c:\Windows\SysWOW64 folder on 64bit Win7 systems. Windows 7 x64 expects to find only 64bit files/services in the system32 folder.

Setup Project for Windows Service won't build under Server 2008 (Visual Studio 2008)

We've got new machines here for doing development on running Server 2008.
With Visual Studio 2008 we're having problems building a Setup Project which installs the Windows Service - Under Custom Actions then Uninstall, "InstallerClass property is only valid for assemblies".
This builds and installs fine on XP SP3.
Has anybody else had any similar problems?
Workstation OS: Server 2008
Software: Visual Studio 2008
Make sure you add the service in the custom actions otherwise the service will not be registered. Other than that, are you having any compilation errors?
I recommend against using the VS install project. Use Wix instead, it's easier than you think.
I did find this - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/447a3y7x(VS.71).aspx
Ive made the changes to the Solution and now waiting for it to be tested on a Server 2008 machine - Im still on XP SP3.
I was getting this error when running commandline devenv.exe to build a .vdproj file (in Nant scripts). The problem was I was not also building the dependant project first, so once that was done it worked fine.
It had nothing to do with the configuration of the InstallerClass property after all.

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