Unable to merge Windows Installer database

[mills]

Yes, excellent investigation! I finally got a chance to verify this. I didn't test Visual Studio installation...

Here are my observations:

- Orca could not be installed if InstallAware was running.
- After installing Orca, any project with any msm module added to it would not compile.
- Installing Orca first did not cause a problem.

At the very least, it's good to have this documented, but I'll notify our developers and see if there's nothing we can do about it.

[dunion]

I think if you build against the newer COM dll all will suddenly get fixed

[CFConner]

This is a follow up - has this been fixed?

[giaviv]

Dear CFConner,

I am not sure whether this has been fixed, however you can work around this easily as noted in the thread (in fact, I am using both InstallAware and Orca and never encountered problems).

[WoofPuppy]

Our company just purchased IA Studio and just today I ran into this problem. I had no problem compiling a project with 32 bit merge modules but got the error (mentioned several times above) when compiling an identical project with 64 bit merge modules. I spent a good bit of time searching the forums and when I ran across this thread I simply couldn't believe that an issue such as this, identified 3 years ago, has not been fixed.

If you are not going to fix this issue, please at least put a note somewhere in the documentation about the workaround.

Otherwise I am very happy with this product.

Thanks,

Steve

[FrancescoT]

Dear Steve,

I just tried to add a x64 merge module (Microsoft_VC100_MFC_x64.msm) to a test project, and I am able to build the project correctly using the latest IA version (18.08). In addition, with the generated package the above runtimes get installed correctly on a target x64 OS.

For your convenience, you can find the test project attached (includes the used merge module within the project folder).

Regards

[alibaba]

Since today I get the error:

"Unable to merge Windows Installer database with module Microsoft_VC100_ATL_x86"

On monday the setup builds fine and the merge modules were intergrated correct. I have not changed anything in the project.
I also tried to reintegrate the MergeModules but always during built I get the above error message and build process stops.

What could be the reason?!

I am using IA 17.9.20.13

EDIT: on another computer the installation was building without problems. What can I do? Reinstall IA?

[FrancescoT]

Dear Alibaba,

Honestly ... it really quite strange... you could try with reinstalling IA, but I am not quite sure you will be able to solve the issue.

Could be even this one an Anti Virus related issue?

Regards

[WoofPuppy]

Hi Francesco,

Thanks for the response, sorry it took me awhile to get back.

The way I got my 64 bit merge modules to compile was to implement the workaround mentioned earlier in this thread. I renamed mergemod.dll (found in C:\Program Files\Common Files\microsoft shared\MSI Tools) and copied the IA dll of the same name into that location. To test your sample project I simply reversed that workaround and tried to compile your project. However, I still get the same error, Error during build: Unable to merge Windows Installer database with module Microsoft_VC100_MFC_x64.

If I reinstate the workaround everything works fine. I am using 32 bit Windows 7, that may have something to do with it.

It is simply a dll hell issue where two ActiveX dlls with the same name exist on the same machine.

Cheers,

Steve

[FrancescoT]

Dear Steve,

many thanks for reporting it ... it'll be useful to anyone that may have the same problem.

Regards

[alibaba]

My IA is working well again. I am quite sure that is related to Adaware or Malwarebytes AntiMalware. Because I did a system cleaning with this two programs and afterwards IA brought the above error. After reinstalling InstallAware is was working well again.