Custom Error Message Broke in SP2

[David Rueter]

I want to use Internet Explorer 6 in an unattended kiosk (no keyboard, touch
screen only).

Should IE loose a connection to the web server, I want it to be able to
retry automatically.

I created a custom error page to replace the standard DNSERROR.HTM in
shdoclc.dll, and updated shdoclc.dll with this new page. This page provides
a Reload button, as well as uses a timer to reload the target URL every few
seconds.

Everything works great in Win2K and XP prior to SP2. However, with IE 6
post-SP2 IE insists on loading the error page from some other location (i.e.
does not use DNSERROR.HTM in shdoclc.dll)--resulting in the standard "The
page cannot be displayed" message.

I did a clean install of XP in VirtualPC, and carefully applied hotfixes,
SP1, more hot fixes, then SP2 testing after each update to IE. I am quite
certain that all versions of IE6 on XP prior to SP2 work fine (meaning that
they use the DNSERROR.HTM from shdoclc.dll as expected.)

Note that the version of IE 6 that is not working on XP SP2 is reported as
6.0.2900.2180.xpsp_sp2_gdr.050301-1519. Versions of IE6 up through KB918899
(that updated shdoclc.dll to 6.00.2900.2180) work fine.

Could somebody either 1) give me some clues on where IE 6 post-SP2 looks for
the error message page, and/or 2) provide a suggestion on how to have IE
gracefully recover from connection problems in an unattended kiosk
environment?

David Rueter
(e-mail address removed)

 

[David Rueter]

Never mind. I tracked it down:

In XP SP2 Microsoft copied the HTML resources for the IE error pages to
xpsp2res.dll (and seemingly orphaned the resources in shdoclc.dll).

Modifying xpsp2res.dll did the trick.

I really wish there were a cleaner way to do this...but at least with this
hack IE can now be used in an unattended kiosk environment.

Sincerely,

David Rueter
(e-mail address removed)