Debugging WIX MSI installer issues

On one particular PC after software installation, whenever user tried to launch the application, software installation configuration dialog was popping up continuously. And this was observed on very few PC’s.

After intense googling I found one thread that discussed about self-repair mechanism of WIX installer and it proved useful.

WIX installer generally logs “Windows Events” which can be referred to find out root cause of issues.

Another way is to inspect log generated by MSI. See below example

msiexec /i "C:\MyPackage\Example.msi" /L*V "C:\log\example.log"

This screenshot should help for Windows event log based debugging –

 

MSI log in Windows Event Viewer

Here are some quick references for WIX/MSI installer:

Advanced Installer User Guide: Generate MSI logs as per need

Real-World Example: WiX/MSI Application Installer

Windows Installer Guide (on MSDN)

Property Reference (on MSDN)

Good thread on: How to add a WiX custom action that happens only on specific activity (such as “Uninstall”)