I don't even know why I continue to use adobe products. Adobe software development is a joke. So are their UIs.
First, this forum crashed my FireFox 3.0.10 browser, twice. The second time, I figured out it was Adobe's fault. Why doesn't Adobe learn to script AJAX properly so it doesn't crash browsers? So here I am in IE8 typing a reply.
All of you guys were beating around the bush in regards to the "solution" to this problem. I have found a way to apply the patch and use an MST generated by the Adobe Customization Wizard. Granted, it would be much better if Adobe would just generate their patches correctly to begin with.
As you all have found out, you cannot create an MST using the ACW (Adobe Customization Wizard) and then use the following command
msiexec /i AcroRead.msi /p AdbeRdrUpd912_all_incr.msp /t
This will cause the aforementioned problem. Below is the proper sequence of events:
- Make a backup copy of the 9.1.0 AcroRead.msi (just in case).
- Run the following command: msiexec /a AcroRead.msi /p AdbeRdrUpd912_all_incr.msp This command will create an Administrative Install Point (AIP) in the directory you choose. I will place it in a directory called Patched The AcroRead.msi file will be rewritten and will be version 9.1.2 (check the Property table with ORCA and look at the value ProductVersion). In addition, the files that were in Data1.cab will be expanded and patched and are in the Patched folder I specified above. At this point, we no longer need the Data1.cab file. If you know how, you could compress all the files back into a cab and insert them back into the media table, but that is overly complicated and I forget how to do it successfully. In any event, the major benefit would be some space savings. If you had a lot of apps like this, it would be beneficial; but for one, not so much so.
- Open AcroRead.msi with ACW. Make any changes you want for your installation. However, the following changes must be made or browser integration will be broken (per an earlier post in this thread):
- Go to the Registry item in the left-hand menu.
- Under the Destination Computer section, navigate to the following key: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\acrobat\DefaultIcon.
- Modify the (Default) value to the following: [READER]AcroRd32.exe. NOTE: This only applies if you are installing Adobe Reader. If you are installing Acrobat, this may not apply, but I am not sure. YMMV.
- This step was updated 10 July 2009 11:30:00 EST (GMT-05:00). If your are performing application virtualization, you will want to make te following changes to the MSI (via ORCA or ACW). I'm making these changes from ACW. The installer will fail during application sequencing during the installation of the Adobe Updater Manager (AUM). For virtualized applications, this component is unnecessary and should not be installed. Other sites lead you through a lengthy, risky process to eliminate the installation of the AUM. This step will eliminate the installation of AUM with two simple changes to the MSI.
- In ACW, select the Direct Editor node from the left hand side.
- Select the Feature table.
- On the right side, locate the features named AUM and Updater. Note that the Level field for both features are 1. Change the Level field for both fields to be 200. Actually, any number greater than 100 will do, but 200 is a nice round number. Since the installer defaults to INSTALLLEVEL=100 (see the Property table), any feature with a Level value of 100 or less will be installed. Since we have now given these features an install level of 200, these features will not be installed. Generally, this tactic can be used on any component you wish not to have installed (for Adobe Reader and some other applcations with simple installers), such as AIR and Acrobat.com. Those are the only two changes that need to be made to not have AUM installed.
- To make sure your users don't encounter an error while running Adobe Reader, make sure, in ACW, to uncheck the box Disable all updates under the Online and Acrobat.com Features section.
- Save the package (in ACW, File->Save Package). This modifies the setup.ini file so that it will use the changes you just made (saved by default in AcroRead.mst).
I left my original instructions below, but marked as deleted. Please see step 5 below these deleted instructions. This is a new step. If you are performing application virtualization, you want to make the following changes to the MSI (via ORCA or ACW). I'm making these changes via ACW. The installer will fail during application squencing due to not being able to create to two certain registry keys. This is the easiest way that I can think of to get this to work.- Start your sequencing machine (in my case, a VM).
- Install Adobe Reader 9.1.x (do not sequence, simply install).
- Once installation completes, open the Registry Editor (assuming Windows Vista; if using WinXP or below, try RegEdt32.exe).
- Browse to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Installer\Win32Assemblies\Global
- Double click the following entry (make sure you get the right one, there are two similar entries!): Microsoft.VC80.CRT,publicKeyToken="1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b",type="win32",version="8.0.50727.762",processorArchitecture="x86".
- Copy the value of the entry (on Vista, the value is already highlighted,simply right-click and choose Copy. Otherwise, right-click and choose Select All and then right-click again and choose Copy.).
- Paste this value into Notepad. Save the file, making sure to select the Unicode encoding type from the Encoding drop-down list. Save it with the name Microsoft.VC80.CRT.txt
- Back in the registry editor, double-click the following entry: policy.8.0.Microsoft.VC80.CRT,publicKeyToken="1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b",type="win32-policy",version="8.0.50727.762",processorArchitecture="x86".
- Copy the value of the entry (on Vista, the value is already highlighted,simply right-click and choose Copy. Otherwise, right-click and choose Select All and then right-click again and choose Copy.).
- Paste this value into Notepad. Save the file, making sure to select the Unicode encoding type from the Encoding drop-down list. Save it with the name policy.8.0.Microsoft.VC80.CRT.txt
- Close the registry editor.
- Reset your VM so it is clean for the sequencing (i.e. revert to a snapshot).
- Back in the ACW, at the Registry portion, navigate to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT.
- Right-click HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT and selet New->Key. Name the new key Installer.
- Right-click the Installer key and select New->Key again. Name the key Win32Assemblies.
- Create a new key in Win32Assemblies called Global.
- Select the Global key you just created.
- On the right-side of the editor, right-click and choose New->Multi-String Value. Name the new value: Microsoft.VC80.CRT,publicKeyToken="1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b",type="win32",version="8.0.50727.762",processorArchitecture="x86".
- Right-click the new value and select Modify
- Open the text file Microsoft.VC80.CRT.txt you created aboe.
- Press CTRL+A or Edit->Select All (in Notepad) and then press CTRL+C (or Edit->Copy).
- Back in ACW, paste the value from the clipboard and click OK.
- Now right-click the editor and choose New->Multi-String Value again. Name it policy.8.0.Microsoft.VC80.CRT,publicKeyToken="1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b",type="win32-policy",version="8.0.50727.762",processorArchitecture="x86".
- Open the policy.8.0.Microsoft.VC80.CRT.txt file created above.
- Copy the file contents as the value of the new entry in the ACW.
Save the package. You should now be ready to install Adobe Reader via Setup.exe for sequencing.
- Updated 10 July 2009 12:00:00 EST (GMT-05:00).
We have one more step to perform just to clean things up bit. I'm going to create another AIP using the patched MSI and our newly created MST. However, this does not work quite as one would expect. - Run the following command: msiexec /a AcroRead.msi /t <Your_transform.mst>. I created this AIP in a folder called PatchedTransformed.
- The above step created another AIP in the PatchedTransformed folder. What's different about this AIP compared to the one made at the beginning of this procedure is that the MSI file was copied to the PatchedTransformed folder as well. However, the MSI is not merged with the changes from the MST as I expected. There are two things you can do:
- Modify the setup.ini file and add the following line to the [Product] section: CmdLine=TRANSFORMS="<Your_Transform.mst>", or
- Use ORCA. Open your patched MSI in ORCA. Choose Transform->Apply Transform... and select the transform generated by the ACW. Then choose File->Save Transformed As... and give the transformed MSI a new name, e.g. Custom-AdobeReader-9.1.2.msi.
That's it. You now have a fully patched and modified Adobe Reader installer ready for installation or application virtualization.
At this point, you should have an MSI and MST. If you want, you can use ORCA to merge the MST into the MSI. If you're using Setup.exe, you're going to have to change th Setup.ini file.
To test that everything works, you can copy the files to a test directory and perform the following command: msiexec /a <AdobeReader.msi> [/t <Your_transform.mst>] Replace with the name of your MSI file and optionally, pass in your transform (definitely do this if you made a separate MST!). If all goes well, the installation should go well, too. During sequencing, you will still get an MSI installer error (actually, 2), number 1406, about not being able to write to two registry keys. These were the registry keys we added in the steps above. This does not happen on normal installatons.
Please also note that I don't know whether the roaming user profile problem menioned in http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/404/kb404597.html is fixed in version 9.1.2. It was not fixed as of 9.1.0.163. This is all posted AS-IS. YMMV.
UPDATE:
In case you don't know, I will share a bit of enlightenment I had with my procedure above. This specifically relates to application virtualization and sequencing Adobe Reader for MS App-V.
In step 4, I had you install Adobe Reader on a clean machine and obtain some registry information because otherwise, the installation may not be successful for virtualization. These steps are unneccessary. Here's why: you cannot "patch/upgrade" vitualized applications within the application itself. To patch/upgrade a virtual application, you have to use (in the case of MS App-V) the Application Virtualization Sequencing MMC to load the virtualized app, then run the upgrade/patch so that MS App-V can detect the changes and properly update the package. So what does this mean? Two things. First, whenever I use the ACW, under the Online and Acrobat.com Features section I always uncheck <b>Disable all updates</b>. However, checking this does not necessarily mean Adobe Reader does not install the Adobe Update Manager (AUM); in fact, it does install AUM, which is the feature that contains the component that attempts to write those registry entries and therefore, which is causing the error.
Therefore, the solution (and what should be step 4) is to disable the installation of AUM. Now some have posted at various sites how to disable the installation of AUM by deleting a whole bunch of stuff in the MSI. This is not necessary. The steps are outlined in the new step 4 above. This should resolve sequencing issues.
UPDATE 10 July 2009 12:00:00 EST (GMT-05:00) - Pertains to virtualizing Adobe Reader only.
This doesn't work for virtualizing the application. When importing the application into MS App-V Server Management Console, the application version is still 9.1.0.163 even though the splash screen says 9.1.2. I think that my assessment is correct because of two reasons: 1) I still got the MS VC++ Runtime error when using a normal user with a roaming profile which Adobe said the latest 9.1.1 release fixed (and hence 9.1.2) (the AppData folder included) and for which Adobe's solution is a joke; 2) When I installed my "patched" Reader (as a normal install) with AUM and proceeded to go to Help->Check for Updates, the 9.1.2 update appeared in the list of updates (again, even though the splash screen said it was version 9.1.2). Adobe has got to get their patchng correct!!!
For application virtualization, I'm going to recommend that you sequence the 9.1.0 version through to completion. Then, save the sequence and close it. Then re-open the sequence project for upgrade and applythe 9.1.2 patch. Whether you can use an ACW transform on the 9.1.0 installation and then patch, that's debatable. I sure hope so. If not, perhaps there's a way I can fudge it, namely, create an MST via ACW. Then, manually create an MST with the pertinent settings via ORCA and see if that works, instead.
Having said all that, I seriously doubt this works at all even for GPSI deployment. Sorry all. Will post again when I finally get this application to sequence. Hopefully, the same principles will apply to GPSI deployment.
Message was edited by: TTEConline on 10 July 2009 12:00:00 EST (GMT-05:00)
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) Once I completed the referenced steps, I added the msi package to a GPO un computer settings > software installation. I refreshed the policy and restarted the computers. During the reboot adobe started to install. Worked flawlessly.
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