Major Upgrade fails to install new file not in previous version
I have created a major upgrade to remove and replace the previous installation. There is one new file in the upgrade that was not present in the earlier one. It is a simple dll that we created. On a fresh installation everything works fine. On the upgrade, the new dll is not installed. Any ideas, thanks.
make sure your new file is in a component that has some method of file version associated with it, so that it can be used as a key file. It also could be that the uninstall portion of the 'upgrade' removes the file just installed.
If your file is associated with a component that has a key file that does not need to be upgraded then the file will not be installed. If the file is in a component that does not have a key file, then it will use the target directory to determine if it needs to be installed. So if the target is [INSTALLDIR] then, the file will only be installed if the target directory is missing, which in most all cases for upgrades will already exist, and so your file is not installed.If this is the case then just add a key file, it can be anything. I typically use a text file with the application version number as its content. That way for each release, the version number changes, and when the installer checks the key file to see if it already exists on the system, it will see that it does not and install all files in that particular component.
There could be some other component rule that I am missing here too. One thing to try is to run validation for your MSI. See if that identifies any problems.
