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‎Jul 23, 2009
05:50 AM
expanding archive problems
Hello there,
We have a strange problem. Our installer as part of installation process expands an archive to a specified folder, but from time to time, this step causes problem, i.e. the files from archive are corrupted or not copied at all.
This happens much more often if you launch the installer from LAN without copying it to your computer. We have a machine that builds overnight and some users just click on the executable file without copying it to their machine and then come back and complain that the installed product cannot be launched. I come there and see that some files from archive are not copied or find a binary file or two having one symbol changed.
I have attached the screen shot of advanced designer showing the steps/actions dealing with archive. I am pretty sure something goes wrong there, because when the users complain about file corruption, the next time they launch exactly the same installer, everything goes fine, which means that the archive embedded withing the installer is not corrupted itself. Plus I also added md5 hash for builds and the users do check if the installer itself is corrupted during copying process over LAN. It never is actually.
This problem is strange and happens on Vista and XP.
Can you think of a solution or what is the cause? Maybe there is a known bug?
Thanks in advance!
We have a strange problem. Our installer as part of installation process expands an archive to a specified folder, but from time to time, this step causes problem, i.e. the files from archive are corrupted or not copied at all.
This happens much more often if you launch the installer from LAN without copying it to your computer. We have a machine that builds overnight and some users just click on the executable file without copying it to their machine and then come back and complain that the installed product cannot be launched. I come there and see that some files from archive are not copied or find a binary file or two having one symbol changed.
I have attached the screen shot of advanced designer showing the steps/actions dealing with archive. I am pretty sure something goes wrong there, because when the users complain about file corruption, the next time they launch exactly the same installer, everything goes fine, which means that the archive embedded withing the installer is not corrupted itself. Plus I also added md5 hash for builds and the users do check if the installer itself is corrupted during copying process over LAN. It never is actually.
This problem is strange and happens on Vista and XP.
Can you think of a solution or what is the cause? Maybe there is a known bug?
Thanks in advance!
(14) Replies
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‎Jul 23, 2009
06:16 AM
The archive is 126 Mb if that helps.
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‎Jul 23, 2009
06:19 AM
Well it used to be true that network installations from non-mapped drives were not supported: http://community.zerog.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard.cgi?s=4a6832a90f8cffff;act=ST;f=14;t=5406;hl=install+and+from+and+network
but this should no longer be an issue though: http://community.zerog.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard.cgi?s=4a6832a90f8cffff;act=ST;f=15;t=7449;hl=install+and+from+and+network
However, your issue is most peculiar. While there might be an explanation for not all files being extracted from a .zip archive, the installer is merely doing installer operations, it doesn't fiddle with binary contents (unless maybe when instructed). Isn't there anything in the installer that could alter the binaries (obviously, this is hard to do without the installer project file). But on the other hand, I'm not sure that using .zip archives is such a good thing because it defeats the whole purpose of the installer: the installer will install a single .zip archive file that it'll uncompress. Maybe you should relay more on adding files directly into the setup or even better on SpeedFolders (SpeedFolders install all files and subfolders of any given folder, and this can be refined using filters). The advantage of that? Well, in case you enable installation log you will be able to see which files are installed and if there are any files missing.
but this should no longer be an issue though: http://community.zerog.com/cgi-bin/ikonboard.cgi?s=4a6832a90f8cffff;act=ST;f=15;t=7449;hl=install+and+from+and+network
However, your issue is most peculiar. While there might be an explanation for not all files being extracted from a .zip archive, the installer is merely doing installer operations, it doesn't fiddle with binary contents (unless maybe when instructed). Isn't there anything in the installer that could alter the binaries (obviously, this is hard to do without the installer project file). But on the other hand, I'm not sure that using .zip archives is such a good thing because it defeats the whole purpose of the installer: the installer will install a single .zip archive file that it'll uncompress. Maybe you should relay more on adding files directly into the setup or even better on SpeedFolders (SpeedFolders install all files and subfolders of any given folder, and this can be refined using filters). The advantage of that? Well, in case you enable installation log you will be able to see which files are installed and if there are any files missing.
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‎Jul 23, 2009
06:20 AM
experimenter wrote:
The archive is 126 Mb if that helps.
And how big is your installer?
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‎Jul 23, 2009
06:31 AM
Thank you for answer!
Yes, I agree, it is strange and I do not expect anything to be changed but the fact is that from time to time one symbol in one file amongst about 2500 files extracted from archive gets corrupted, sometimes some files do not get copied. It is strange indeed.
Well, it is not only altering, but sometimes the files from archive do not arrive to their destination at all. It is just a matter of exanding an arhive - that is all.
May be you are right.
Are you suggesting that instead of using an archive I should be adding a folder and it will be compressed anyway? Can do that. It is just that eclipse's build process produces a zip archive as a result, but I can unzip it and give a folder to the installer instead.
Need to check if SpeedFolders is the answer.
pv7721 wrote:
However, your issue is most peculiar. While there might be an explanation for not all files being extracted from a .zip archive, the installer is merely doing installer operations, it doesn't fiddle with binary contents (unless maybe when instructed).
Yes, I agree, it is strange and I do not expect anything to be changed but the fact is that from time to time one symbol in one file amongst about 2500 files extracted from archive gets corrupted, sometimes some files do not get copied. It is strange indeed.
pv7721 wrote:
Isn't there anything in the installer that could alter the binaries (obviously, this is hard to do without the installer project file).
Well, it is not only altering, but sometimes the files from archive do not arrive to their destination at all. It is just a matter of exanding an arhive - that is all.
pv7721 wrote:
But on the other hand, I'm not sure that using .zip archives is such a good thing because it defeats the whole purpose of the installer: the installer will install a single .zip archive file that it'll uncompress. Maybe you should relay more on adding files directly into the setup or even better on SpeedFolders (SpeedFolders install all files and subfolders of any given folder, and this can be refined using filters). The advantage of that? Well, in case you enable installation log you will be able to see which files are installed and if there are any files missing.
May be you are right.
Are you suggesting that instead of using an archive I should be adding a folder and it will be compressed anyway? Can do that. It is just that eclipse's build process produces a zip archive as a result, but I can unzip it and give a folder to the installer instead.
Need to check if SpeedFolders is the answer.
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‎Jul 23, 2009
06:32 AM
pv7721 wrote:
And how big is your installer?
I also include jre with it, so it is about 156 Mb with it.
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‎Jul 23, 2009
07:18 AM
experimenter wrote:
Thank you for answer!
You're welcome! 🙂
experimenter wrote:
Are you suggesting that instead of using an archive I should be adding a folder and it will be compressed anyway? Can do that. It is just that eclipse's build process produces a zip archive as a result, but I can unzip it and give a folder to the installer instead.
Need to check if SpeedFolders is the answer.
Indeed, oversimplifying a little, one could say that an IA-made setup is nothing but a big .zip archive with some intelligence around it (in order to check that you can peek into a setup.exe, all the resources are in one big .zip file called Resource1.zip). So indeed yes, if you include a folder or a speedfolder it'll end up in this .zip file. They do however put a speedfolder inside of .jar file (which is just another .zip format) but why they do that it's still a mystery to me).
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‎Jul 23, 2009
07:48 AM
OK, thanks again!
I will try this SpeedFolder thing. Maybe simplifying the installation process will solve this problem.
I will try this SpeedFolder thing. Maybe simplifying the installation process will solve this problem.
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‎Jul 23, 2009
08:19 AM
Please tell me: does this happen for a single user or for more than user? If it happened for a single user, I would say that there might be a case of memory corruption (like a RAM being faulty) but if it happens for more than one user, and they're all installing over the network, I would look into networking issues (faulty networking equipment).
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‎Jul 23, 2009
08:27 AM
pv7721 wrote:
Please tell me: does this happen for a single user or for more than user? If it happened for a single user, I would say that there might be a case of memory corruption (like a RAM being faulty) but if it happens for more than one user, and they're all installing over the network, I would look into networking issues (faulty networking equipment).
This happens for several users actually. As I said this happens more often when the installer is launched from a shared folder over LAN, but yesterday it happened when a user copied the installer to his PC first.
A hypothesis of RAM being faulty is an interesting one, actually. Should the RAM be checked? It is interesting, because the user who complains most often has an old PC. 🙂
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‎Jul 23, 2009
08:48 AM
Well, it happened once for our Source Code Management server: a RAM was faulty so when the file was written on the disk a bit was changed: hopefully, I noticed when building there was an inexplicable error so we checked the SCM server and the file was already badly written on the disk. Or I've seen something else but then there it was more obvious: a laptop had very bad display... but it used shared memory from the RAM: MemTest86 flagged it immediately, as soon as I've replaced it, the display was ok.
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‎Jul 23, 2009
08:53 AM
pv7721 wrote:
Well, it happened once for our Source Code Management server: a RAM was faulty so when the file was written on the disk a bit was changed: hopefully, I noticed when building there was an inexplicable error so we checked the SCM server and the file was already badly written on the disk. Or I've seen something else but then there it was more obvious: a laptop had very bad display... but it used shared memory from the RAM: MemTest86 flagged it immediately, as soon as I've replaced it, the display was ok.
Yes, that is interesting. I have found http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp microsoft utility. Probably easy to check. I will try to do that in the near future. Thanks again!
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‎Jul 23, 2009
10:38 AM
Well I don't know how well it works... being a Microsoft utility 😉 Memtest86+ http://www.memtest.org/ can be downloaded as a small live CD you boot and it continuously runs memory tests...
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‎Jul 23, 2009
10:53 AM
pv7721 wrote:
Well I don't know how well it works... being a Microsoft utility 😉 Memtest86+ http://www.memtest.org/ can be downloaded as a small live CD you boot and it continuously runs memory tests...
Good point! 😄
