Installer Error 2835

[david]

Greetings,

I'm doing some modifications of an existing Visual Studio .NET 2003 C#
project that is to be deployed as a windows service. The solution
includes a project that builds an MSI file. Over the month I've been
working on the project, I've built the MSI file many times. Sometimes
it runs fine and I have a service that can be started and stopped.
Other times, the MSI file starts up, goes through several screens and
then reports "The system cannot open the device or file specified".

Additionally, if I run a working file (from an earlier day), it may
succeed or it may fail. So far I've found no pattern to successes or
failures.

I've turned on installer logging (at the 'voicewarmup' level) and see
the following messages from a failure:

DEBUG: Error 2835: The control ErrorIcon was not found on dialog
ErrorDialog
The installer has encountered an unexpected error installing this
package. This may indicate a problem with this package. The error code
is 2835. The arguments are: ErrorIcon, ErrorDialog,
The system cannot open the device or file specified.
MSI (s) () []: MainEngineThread is returning 110
MSI (c) () []: Note: 1: 2755 2: 110 3: C:\80546\My DIM
Service\Release\My DIM Service.msi
MSI (c) () []: Note: 1: 2262 2: Error 3: -2147287038
DEBUG: Error 2755: Server returned unexpected error 110 attempting to
install package C:\80546\My DIM Service\Release\My DIM Service.msi.
MSI (c) () []: Note: 1: 2262 2: Error 3: -2147287038

The MSI file name given, i.e. "C:\80546\My DIM Service\Release\My DIM
Service.msi", is truly the name of my MSI file.

As an added complication, the MSI file I built last Monday was fine on
Monday, still fine on Wednesday, and started failing on Thursday.

What the heck is going on here?

Does anybody have information about "Error 2835", "ErrorIcon",
"ErrorDialog", etc?

Does anybody know why some builds succeed and others fail?

How do I make Visual Studio .NET 2003 to produce a good MSI file and do
it every time?

Regards,

David

 

[VJ]

This is not the actual error.... this below error appears even when .NET
Framework install or any MSI installation fails.. Sure there is more to this
than what you are seeing... like if you are doing a file copy, is the file
locked. This is just a sample, in your case maybe the service you installed
Monday/Tuesday is not properly unistalled, or some file is locked from the
previous installation.. Please verify that the service you are trying to
install, is not already installed on the machine and is not runing.. etc and
try your new package. It will be fine...

VJ

 

[david]

Obviously I don't know all the answers with respect to Visual Studio
2003 and the Microsoft Installer, else I wouldn't be asking questions.

As mentioned earlier, I have MSI files built on Monday and Wednesday.
They're in directories named 'MSI-0410' and 'MSI-0412' respectively.
Each directory contains 3 files:
My DIM Service.msi
setup.exe
setup.ini

In repeated tests on Wednesday, MSI-0410 installed without a hitch while
MSI-0412 consistently failed to install. Windows' Add/Remove Programs
reported My DIM Service present after a successfull install and didn't
list it after an unsuccessful install.

I've verified that the service isn't present as best I know how. If
there are 'leftover bits' from a failed install, where might they be?

Thanks.

 

[VJ]

If you don't see it in the services.. directory then it is fine...uninstall
is ok. But Please do check other files you install, and any directories and
files under it.. see if it gets removed.., I am sure you would tried
re-starting your computer.. Is there any additional files that you are
trying to install on top 'MSI-0410' build in the 'MSI-0412' build, they
might worth checking to see if the problem is there?. Or maybe when the new
service is trying to install and run, is trying access a locked file because
you have added additional functionality.... All these are just
possibilities...

Let me know how it goes..!!

Vijay