INTRODUCTION:

This article explains best practices for how to troubleshoot the installation of Microsoft Visual Studio 2005. Also, this article explains the general steps for how to situate log files if you experience issue during the installation. More specific errors and issues are addressed in other Knowledge Base articles.

Most installations of Visual Studio 2005 products occur as expected. Microsoft Windows Installer is used to install these products. Windows Installer installation is comparable engine that you can use to develop applications that you deploy in Visual Studio 2005. Therefore the installation smoothly, makes the required log files, and performs complete rollback if potential problems are detected. In addition, the plant heal itself, also known as resilient as the plant is damaged.

Best practice installation methods may prevent many issues. Consider using best practice installation methods for all installations. This contains installations of service packs.

MORE INFORMATION:

Best practice installation methods

• Use the Local Administrator accounts

This stop equally permissions problems and rights problems. The Local Administrator account is the maintenance account. Use this account when you install and uninstall applications.

• Stop all nonessential services and applications

Lots of applications disturb the installation process. This is mainly true of antivirus and other monitoring applications.

• Delete the contents of the Temp folder

The installation wizards often use the Temp folder. If the installation leaves corrupted files or folders in the Temp folder, the installation reapplies the corrupted versions instead of going to the installation resource for fresh copies.

Steps to use best practice installation methods
Use the Local Administrator account

1. Right-click My Computer.

2. Click Manage.

3. Expand Local Users and Groups.

4. Click Users.

5. In the particulars pane, place the Administrator account. Normally, this account is named Administrator, and the computer/domain.

6. Right-click the Administrator account, click Set Password>> follow the instructions that show on the screen, to change the password.
Stop all nonessential services and applications

Important These steps might raise your security risk. These steps can also make your computer or else your network more at risk to attack by malicious users or else by malicious software for example viruses. We recommend the process that these articles explain to allow programs to work as they are planned to, or else to execute precise program capabilities. Before you create these changes, we suggest that you guess the risks that are related with implementing this procedure in your particular environment. If you choose to execute this procedure, take some appropriate other steps to help defend your system. We suggest that you use this process only if you really require this process.

• Microsoft Windows 2000

1. Click Start,>>click Run, type Services.msc >> click OK.

2. Disabled all non-Microsoft services. This contains services for antivirus applications and for other monitoring applications. To stop a service, right-click the service>>then click Stop.

• Microsoft Windows XP and Microsoft Windows Server 2003

Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 have a utility that is named MSConfig. These utilities stop services and applications from starting when you install Visual Studio 2005.

Delete the contents of the Temp folder

1. Click on the Start button>>click Run, type as %temp%, >> click OK. This command opens the Temp folder.

2. If any data are significant as well as should not be deleted, move these data to one more folder. Delete the data of this folder.

Installation

The PC where you install Visual Studio 2005 should never contain had any beta or free candidate Visual Studio product installed. If any one or more of these products were installed, you should rebuild the PC to verify that these products have been removed. To rebuild the PC, reformat the hard disk, and then install the operating system again.

The executable file for Visual Studio 2005 is named Setup.exe. This file is situated in the root folder of Disk 1 of the CD-ROM or DVD-ROM installation media.

During Setup, lists of prerequisites show. The Setup wizard installs the prerequisites that are necessary by the operating system before the Setup wizard installs the Visual Studio 2005 IDE. For more information about prerequisites, notice the "References" section.

By default, verbose logging is turned on for the Visual Studio 2005 installation. The log file is named VSMsiLog*.txt. The asterisk (*) stand for the four alphanumeric characters in the file name.E.g. The file name may be same to VSMSILogA1d1.txt. The file is around 40 megabytes (MB).

Component files and logs

The following table lists each component, the component's location on the installation media, and the log file that is generated.

Component Location on Disk 1 Log or logs generated
Microsoft Windows Installer 3.1 Vs\Wcu\Msi31\Windowsinstaller-kb893803-v2-x86.exe Create the log by using the "Msiexec -i Path\PackageName.msi /l*v Path\log.txt" command after you extract the .msi file from the .exe file
Microsoft MSXML 6.0 Parser Vs\Wcu\MSXML\Msxml6.msi \Local Settings\Temp\MSI*.log
Microsoft Data Access Components 2.8 Vs\Wcu\Mdac28\Mdac_typ.exe Windows Directory \Dasetup.log
Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Vs\Wcu\DotNetFramework\Dotnetfx.exe Documents and Settings\ UserName \Local Settings\Temp\DotNetfx.log and Netfx.log
Microsoft Document Explorer 2005 Vs\Wcu\DExplore Create the log by using the "Msiexec -iPath\PackageName.msi /l*v Path\log.txt" command after you extract the .msi file from the .exe file

Many of these log files are put in the Temp folder and then moved to the \Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\V