Category Archives: News

Microsoft has published a new Knowledge Database regarding an issue with the MSI generation of the APP-V 5.0 SP1 X64 Sequencer. However only the 64-bit sequencer is affected by this issue.

Symptoms are described as following:

Applications that are sequenced through the Microsoft Application Virtualization 5.0 Service Pack 1 (App-V 5.0 SP1) sequencer may not be installed correctly when you try to add the package by using the generated MSI. The MSI setup starts, continues, and then exits without generating an error message. Additionally, a generic event that resembles the following will be logged in the Application log:

Log Name: Application
Source: MsiInstaller
Event ID: 1033
Task Category: None
Level: Information
Keywords: Classic
Description:
Windows Installer installed the product. Product Name: MyApp 1.0 Product Version: 1.0. Product Language: 1033. Manufacturer: Microsoft Corporation. Installation success or error status: 1603.

Note MsiInstaller 1033 events that have a status code of 1603 are generic and only indicate an installation failure. You must collect MSI logs to definitively identify this scenario. For information about how to do this, see the “More Information” section.

Visit the KB Article @ support.microsoft.com for workarounds and more information about this issue.

Regards,

SPA Team

The Microsoft Windows Installer Technology has many different possibilities to speed your software package installation time.

MSIFASTINSTALL

The first obvious property MSIFASTINSTALL=0 can be set and will reduce the installation time. It’s a property introduced by Windows Installer version 5.0

Here the list of available values – good to see what options are part of the default setting

DISABLEROLLBACK

The second property DISABLEROLLBACK=1 is a real installation speed improver for large Windows Installer packages. This property is not well known as it’s property name does not reflect that it will enhance the installation speed aswell.

As this property will disable the rollback function, use it on software packages that have been tested in your target OS environment to make sure that the limited rollback functionality will not used.

MEDIA TYPE

Is your installation still not fast enough? Check the source files! Best performance can be achieved by using external compressed cab files.

LOG FILES

Do not create log files! Log files will slow down your installation. Some vendor installation are using the MsiLogging property that will crates log files. Use a transform file and remove this property from the property table.

Insane but a verbose log file for a large installation can reach very fast unbelievable sizes

At the end combining all small possibilities can rocket speed your installation time. But bear in mind that Windows Installer based setup files will take some time when reaching > 30’000 file resources even using all possible speed enhancement tricks.

Citrix has announced that their Application Streaming technology wont be supported on Windows 2012 Server.

According to “Calvin Hsu” from Citrix Inc.  development has actually stopped and Citrix is now recommending to switch over to Microsofts Application Virtualization Technology App-V.

Citrix wont provide any migration tool, therefore recreation of all packages will be required if you are planning to switch over to Windows 2012 Server for your Citrix environment.

Ontrex SPA has great experience in such migration projects and is one of the leading technical App-V consulting teams in Switzerland. If you need any assistance, we are the right choice for your project!

Source: Techtarget.com

We are happy to announce the immediate availability of AdminStudio 2013 for customers with an existing maintenance plan.

You can download/request your own copy of AdminStudio here:

http://flexerasoftware.force.com/fulfill

Flexera is also providing new serial numbers for “AdminStudio for Symantec'” Customers

Original Quote:

“Special Notice for AdminStudio for Symantec Customers – This is a new Flexera Software serial number and will replace the serial number provided to you by Symantec. Please use this new serial number for fulfillment of AdminStudio 2013.'” 

We offer assistance if you are planning upgrading your AdminStudio Environment or you need any other technical advise.

Regards,

SPA Team

Flexera has released its newest version of their Setup Authoring Software called “InstallShield”. As a matter of fact this will be included in the next major release of  the AdminStudio Suite.

Meanwhile Flexera has published the full change/release notes of InstallShield 2013 here:

Q210472: InstallShield 2013 Release Notes

The most interesting finding so far is that you wont be able to create App-V 5.0 packages if your “building”/”development” machine is not yet running Windows 8 or Windows Server 2012.

What are your thoughts about the new version? Are you satisfied? Let us know in the comments section!

Regards,

Fabio

Symptom

A customer which is using our DPD Version of the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) came across a few hours ago and reported the following issue:

You may receive the following error message when you try to open the Java Control Panel:

Solution / Workaround

After some investigation with Procmon it looked it turned out that a “vital” registry key/value was missing.

As it looks right now the following key will only be written using the original setup bootstrapper (= e.g jre-7u21-windows-i586.exe).

If you are installing directly using the extracted Windows Installer Database / MSI the key wont be written and this may lead into this error message.

How ever it can be easily fixed by adding the missing registry key to the registry or the installation source (e.g  MSI Transform):

32-Bit/X86 JRE on 32-Bit/X86 Windows:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\JavaSoft\Auto Update]
"AUVersion"="2.1.9.5"

32-Bit/X86 JRE on 64-Bit/X64 Windows:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\JavaSoft\Auto Update]
"AUVersion"="2.1.9.5"

64-Bit/X64 JRE on 64-Bit/X64 Windows:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\JavaSoft\Auto Update]
"AUVersion"="2.1.9.5"

Our DPD packages will be updated asap to include this workaround until Oracle fixes this in their installation routine.

If you need any further information or support regarding this problem feel free to contact us.

Additional information: https://forums.oracle.com/thread/2542018

After nearly 4 years with the same blog design (we started this blog back in 2009)  we have decided to  “fresh up” the layout and the design a little. We hope you will enjoy the new design as much as we do!

Regards,

SPA Team

We are proud to announce the newest software package in our “Direct Package Download” portfolio.

Putty is a free and open source lightweight SSH and Telnet Client and currently our customers favorite choice for terminal emulation.

You should be able to order your DPD package from your personal SPA Portal Account as from now!

If you have any further queries please do not hesitate to contact us.

Regards,

SPA Team

Microsoft has released, somehow very quietly, the first service pack for App-V 5.0.

The newest version can be obtained from the recently released “Microsoft Desktop Optimization 2013” DVD which is now available from different sources (PartnerNet, MSDN, Technet)

Change & Release notes:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/library/dn130151.aspx

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-US/library/dn144770.aspx

Regards,

SPA Team