I have a user that runs setup.exe; it comes up briefly, about 2 seconds. It says configuring windows installer and blinks and dies.
User was on XP. I tried creating him a blank installer, no files, one component, one feature. This setup does the exact same thing, blinks and dies.
I tried a MSI with no setup launcher, this works fine.
I also tried upgrading windows installer from 3.1 to 4.5, same problem, setup.exe blinks and dies.
Since this happens on any InstallShield setup.exe, it’s a problem with the InstallShield setup launcher, and I am hoping someone has seen this problem before.
You might want to try creating and looking at a verbose setup.exe log. You can generate this with the parameter /debuglog and if necessary can append a path directly to that if, for instance, it's running in a read-only location (e.g. /debuglog"c:\temp\setup.log").
Looks like we get to launch the MSI, but instead of transitioning to the MSI, it just dies.
Something like this
-9-2009[06:26:32]: Attempting to launch: MSIEXEC.EXE /i "C:\DOCUME~1\mobryan\LOCALS~1\Temp\{F37AFA29-DDC5-4566-A6CB-FBE422A143C2}\test.msi" SETUPEXEDIR="C:\Documents and Settings\mobryan\Desktop\deleteme\blank\fresh" SETUPEXENAME="setup.exe" 11-9-2009[06:27:10]: Launch result 1, exit code 0 11-9-2009[06:27:12]: Dumping setup.ini... .............Contents of Setup.ini............................... 11-9-2009[06:27:13]: Setup returning 0
Next we should see the MSI, but instead, nothing.
Not sure why.
For the web install it get to the point where is says downloading MSI, but it never runs. The MSI is not launched. The MSI runs when typing in the URL, but the product won't run without all the prerequisites.
This appears to indicate it's the MSI which is having problems. The half minute delay, as well as the return code of 1 both suggest that msiexec was successfully launched (if the launch failed, it would not get to this message). However a return code of 1 is not a great omen. What does a verbose MSI log say happens? setup.exe /v"/l*v c:\path\to\msi.log" (Feel free to keep the /debuglog parameter if you like; they're complementary.)
I first tried this the MSI I am shipping. When this had problems, I tried this for a blank setup, one component, one feature, no files. The same problem happens for the blank setup and the commerical MSI I am shipping on his system. We never get to the MSI, the setup tries to launch it. The log we are looking at is for a blank setup, one component, one feature. It took 20 seconds to create.
I understand that this MSI isn't particularly meaningful. I'm hoping the log will give some indication why it exits without showing you the interface you expect. An empty sample project, as you describe, works fine here. I tend to create mine by adding notepad2.exe in the Files and Folders view, and letting it auto-create the feature and component.
I also slightly misread the above output. The launch result of 1 is fine; the exit code of 0 is also "perfect" in that it indicates msiexec returned no error. So anything else should be in the verbose MSI log.
