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Explorer.exe is killed by MSI

Hi there,

I'm trying to silently install Camtasia, but the installation kills explorer. 

The command is:
msiexec.exe /i "camtasia.msi" /qn COMPANYNAME="COMP" USERNAME="Authorized User" TSC_SOFTWARE_KEY="KEY" TSC_LICENSEMODE="Full" TSC_SHOWREGISTERONLINEDIALOG="false" TSC_REDIRECTTOTHANKYOUPAGE="false" TSC_UPDATE_ENABLE="0"

After the installation, explorer is killed and can be started with Task Manager > New Task > Explorer.exe

Is there a way to tell the command not to kill Explorer? I tried to find it on Google, but i seriously can't find a correct answer. 

Greetings,

Mark

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Answers (1)

Answer Summary:
Posted by: rad33k 7 years ago
Fourth Degree Brown Belt
2

Top Answer

First of all you would need to find what/which action terminates explorer.exe process. If this is a custom action you may try to disable it. If this is handled by the MSI mechnisms you may try with:
MSIRESTARTMANAGERCONTROL=Disable (I would also add REBOOT=ReallySuppress a.k.a /noreboot)

If some of the files installed by the MSI package are loaded into Windows shell (are in use by the explorer.exe process) Windows Installer engine should create entries in PendingFileRenameOperation registry value and these files will be replaced on next reboot (you can't replace files that are curently loaded by some process(es) ).

Comments:
  • Thanks for your comment.

    I'm going to try REBOOT=ReallySuppress & MSIRESTARTMANAGERCONTROL=Disable

    How can i determine what/which action kills the explorer? Do you have any tips/ any tools? I'm a beginner in packaging.

    Thx! - Markje678 7 years ago
    • Create a verbose log file and you should be able to see what is killing Explorer - unless it's a Custom Action. The actions from CA's don't get logged, so you'll have to inspect each one to figure out what they're doing. - vjaneczko 5 years ago
  • Thanks! REBOOT=ReallySuppress & MSIRESTARTMANAGERCONTROL=Disable worked!! - Markje678 7 years ago
    • For people who are using SCCM (like me), i had to use /norestart instead of:

      REBOOT=ReallySuppress & MSIRESTARTMANAGERCONTROL=Disable

      EDIT: My apologies i was wrong, a combination of an edited MSI installer and a bad PowerShell script i made, made me believe the above. - JasperMT 5 years ago
      • Mhmmmm.... I'm wondering what was the difference between /norestart and REBOOT=ReallySuppress in your case. I always thought the result is the same.
        As per MS docs:
        https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/desktop/msi/standard-installer-command-line-options
        [q] /norestart ....
        [!Note]
        The equivalent Windows Installer command line has REBOOT=ReallySuppress set on the command line. [/q] - rad33k 5 years ago
 
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