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RoboHTML.exe and WHOffice.exe hang at "Windows Installer"

New Here ,
Dec 09, 2008 Dec 09, 2008

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When we try to start RoboHelp either with RoboHTML.exe or with WHOffice.exe, it brings up a window labelled "Windows Installer" with "Preparing to install..." and a Cancel buton inside. It never gets beyond this and if I press Cancel, the window locks and has to be killed in Task Manager. I have tried everything I can think of including uninstalling all the X5 updates, uninstalling the entire X5 product, deleting its Program Files directory, rebooting and reinstalling RoboHelp Office X5 from CD using my key starting with RHO13. I've also tried updating the Windows installer. The problem occurs even under different logins (all with administrative privileges). Any idea what could be the problem?
Thank you for any help you can give!
Scott Wallace
Ternion Corporation

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Community Expert ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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Scott

Unless your body parts need enlarging, I would remove your email address from the post before the spam starts!

I can't recall seeing anything like this reported. From what you say the product completes its installation without reporting any errors. If you then open RH from the desktop icons without having logged out, does it then run OK or does the installer message appear even at that stage?

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New Here ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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Hi Peter, thanks for the warning; I updated my post.

Yes, even right after installing RH, when I run it from the desktop icon, it brings up the Windows Installer dialog and stops there. Oddly enought though, it *will* run the RoboHelp for Word, just not the two mentioned portions (RoboHTML and WHOffice). Really not sure where to go from here short of a complete system rebuild (which I'd really rather not do...lol)

Thanks, Scott

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Community Expert ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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Have you got a spare PC with a clean install of Windows and Office and not connected to your network to try installing on?

Are profiles on the C drive or a network?

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New Here ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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I've installed it onto her laptop as a temporary workaround and it works fine there.
Her profile is on the C drive, but I logged in as administrator and installed it from that login but it still had the same problem. I'm running out of hair to pull out...lol

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LEGEND ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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Hi all

Sometimes we see that another application has horked (that's a technical term) the Windows installer. We also see it sometimes with Captivate too. I believe when this happens you have to run a cleanup utility for the Windows Installer.

You should consider visiting the link below and downloading Microsoft's installer cleanup utility. See if that corrects the issue on the affected PC.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290301

Cheers... Rick

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New Here ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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quote:

Originally posted by: Captiv8r
Hi all

Sometimes we see that another application has horked (that's a technical term) the Windows installer. We also see it sometimes with Captivate too. I believe when this happens you have to run a cleanup utility for the Windows Installer.

You should consider visiting the link below and downloading Microsoft's installer cleanup utility. See if that corrects the issue on the affected PC.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/290301

Cheers... Rick


Hi Rick,
Actually, I installed the cleanup utility and after uninstalling RH, there was no listing for RH in the utility. Maybe I don't know the way its supposed to be used. Are you supposed to run the cleanup on RH after RH is installed?
As additional info, there are several other Adobe products installed on this machine including:

Acrobat 8.1.2 Standard
Illustrator CS3
Photoshop 6.0
Shockwave Player 11
SVG Viewer 3.0
Winsoft Linguistics Plugin

As well as Pinnacle Studio 12, Picasa 2 and ProDAD to name a few other installed programs.
Don't know if any of those could be causing the problem.

Thanks Rick,
Scott

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LEGEND ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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Hi Scott

The thing is, the fact launching (insert application here) spawns the installer doesn't really indicate that it's THAT application that caused the issue! It may require some sleuthing to determine exactly *which* application caused the installer to become horked.

Cheers... Rick

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New Here ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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Hey Rick,
Do you think the installer could be messed up even after I updated it to a later version (in hopes of fixing it)? Maybe I should try to install Process Monitor from Sysinternals and see if that may give any indication of what is going on. Just not sure what's going on.

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New Here ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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Also, just FAI (for Anyone's information...lol) :
I have also tried the fixes/updates listed on Adobe's Robohelp downloads page:
http://www.adobe.com/support/robohelp/downloads.html
including the X502, but still to no avail. It does seem that some other program must be causing the problem, but if so, not sure which one it is.

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Community Expert ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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I think I now know the problem. It was your post about installing on the laptop that gave me the clue.

X5 has to be installed and run using the author's login with admin rights attached. It cannot be installed with your login.

Try that and let us know if that works.

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New Here ,
Dec 10, 2008 Dec 10, 2008

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Hey Peter,
Just as further info, I installed X5 as administrator and attempted to run it under the administrator login but it still failed. I can try removing it and reinstalling it under the user's login (which also is in the administrators group) <I think the user originally did the reinstall, but we can try it again>.

*** Here is some new information: ***
I had the user leave the "Windows Installer" window up for a long time (about 30-40 minutes) and eventually it came up with an error:

Install server not responding

with a question mark icon and retry and cancel buttons. Hitting cancel here and waiting about 30 more minutes and it gave the same "Install server not responding" message. Ended up killing the task. Hopefully that may give some hint as to what's going on.

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Community Expert ,
Dec 11, 2008 Dec 11, 2008

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Installing and running as admin should be OK. The Install Server bit could be relevant. In all the attempts have you tried installing from CD using the same logon for installation and running, both with local admin rights?

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New Here ,
Dec 11, 2008 Dec 11, 2008

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Yes, installed and ran as administrative user. Yeah, I agree that the "Install Server" thing must indicate something; just not sure what...lol

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New Here ,
Dec 11, 2008 Dec 11, 2008

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As an update, after I left yesterday, the user sent me an email with a screenshot of a new window that finally came up. It is the Macromedia Activation window saying that "You must activate to continue using RoboHelp HTML."

We have now overwritten the robohelp.exe and robohtml.exe files with the "no activation" versions from the website and are trying again. It is still hanging at the same window, but we'll see what eventually happens now.

thanks, Scott

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New Here ,
Dec 12, 2008 Dec 12, 2008

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Ok, some new info!
After putting the "no activation" version of the files in place, starting RoboHelp HTML, it went through a long wait and eventually brought up the "Install Server not responding" message. Hit "Cancel" and it waited for a long while before eventually bringing up the "Install server..." message again, hit Cancel again and so forth. After going through the "Install server not responding, hit Cancel, wait (almost forever) and get Install server..., hit Cancel..." session for three times, the program finally did come on up and is usable. (We'll be sure not to close it until absolutely necessary!)

The entire process from the first attempt to start RoboHelp HTML and being able to use it was about 4 hours with the waits and cancels and all. So far, it seems that the only way to fix this will be to start the computer all over completely reinstalling Windows and all applications. Sure don't want to put the user through all that if I can help it, but I'm running out of ideas.
Thanks for everyone's thoughts and suggestions!

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Community Expert ,
Dec 12, 2008 Dec 12, 2008

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I must be missing something. Everything is screaming at that install server. Why can't you try it with a CD?

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New Here ,
Dec 17, 2008 Dec 17, 2008

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Hey Peter,
Already tried it with the install CD in the drive, but still have the same problem. I'm going to rebuild the system tomorrow, OS and everything. RoboHelp will be one of the early installs once it is up and running. If it works good, I'll load all the other apps and see if it still works. If it stops working again, I'll know it is one of the apps that is breaking it. I suspect, though, that some random thing must have happened and that once the system is reloaded, it will all work together fine.
I'll report back here when its done to confirm that the problem is gone.

Thanks again to everyone who tried to help!

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Community Expert ,
Dec 17, 2008 Dec 17, 2008

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I would apply all OS updates and install Word and its updates before you install RH.

Hope to hear some good news tomorrow. Good luck.

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New Here ,
Dec 19, 2008 Dec 19, 2008

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Hi everyone,
Just finished reloading the OS and Office on the machine and loaded X5. It works! Hurray! Only thing is it wants to register, so I"ll have to go back to my notes on fixing that. At least its not hanging though; yay!

Thanks again for everyones help!

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Community Expert ,
Dec 19, 2008 Dec 19, 2008

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It wants to register or activate?

No point in registering. X5 is no longer supported.

You cannot activate. Remember the download that replaces the exe files. See Snippets on my site if you have lost the link.

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New Here ,
Dec 19, 2008 Dec 19, 2008

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Yeah, activate, that's what I meant rather than register...lol
So, right, I copied the "no-activate" versions into place and it is happy now. I've found there are more updates to Office, so I'm loading those now. Thankfully, X5 is starting like its supposed to. I'll continue loading the other apps and recheck to be sure RH continues to start right. If it stops working, I'll know what app broke it. Hopefully, it was just one of those freak things that won't happen again.

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Community Expert ,
Dec 19, 2008 Dec 19, 2008

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I did say to load all Office updates first. You might find they will break RH. However, this time it should just require an uninstall and reinstall of RH without issues.

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New Here ,
Dec 22, 2008 Dec 22, 2008

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LATEST
Ok, I've finished all the installations and such and it all works fine now! Thanks again to everyone! It was apparently just a problem with something, somewhere being corrupted. A clean OS install and reload of all apps cleared it up.

Everyone have a very Merry Christmas!

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RoboHelp Documentation
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