Issues registering DLLs and COM Components during MSI installer

Question

I have a huge Windows Desktop application that I have developed. Part of this includes DLLs to manage capturing Video and Pictures, and another custom COM Component Interop that I did not write.

When I install the program on a clean installation of XP, I get errors when trying to access those parts of the program saying that the respective classes are not registered.

Every Project in the Solution is set up as x86, so it is not an issue of attempting to register/access 32 bit COM libraries from a 64 bit environment.

The two DLLs for the Video capturing are in the Installer's list of Detected Dependencies. Both are set to "Register: vsdraCOM".

The other set of COM Components does not show up in my list of Detected Dependencies at all. I have created an Interop DLL for them, so could it be integrated into that Project's DLL?

Is there something basic that I'm missing, or do I need to write my own Custom Actions to register these during installation (and unregister during uninstallation)?

Answer 1

I think you answered your own question. You should write custom actions to install the COM Components.

see: What is the interop dll?

Answer 2

I did have write my own Custom Action, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I was expecting it to be.

I had several different components I had to register, so I created a private method for it. I'll share my code here in case anyone else needs help.

Like all the other examples of Custom Actions, this should go inside it's own Project as a Class Library. The class should be a Component Class type. Then just copy the Project Output into the Install, Rollback, and Uninstall folders in the Custom Actions View of your Installer. (Admittedly, because of this having the Commit method in the code below is unnecessary, but I'm leaving it in there for completionist sake).

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.ComponentModel;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Windows.Forms;
using System.IO;

namespace BKForensics.Workbench.InstallerPermissions {
    [RunInstaller(true)]
    public partial class ServiceInstaller : System.Configuration.Install.Installer {
        // This will be the path that all of the DLLs will be located in under Program Files.
        // In the File System of the Installer Project, this is the "Application Folder"
        // The Properties have the Default Location set to [ProgramFilesFolder][Manufacturer]\[ProductName]
        private const string InstallationPath = @"C:\Program Files\Installation";

        // This is the list I had of all the DLLs and OCX files I needed to install for easy reference.
        private const string OCX = "something.ocx";
        private const string Excel = "Interop.Excel.dll";
        private const string Word = "Interop.Word.dll";
        private const string Office = "Interop.Microsoft.Office.Core.dll";

        public override void Install(System.Collections.IDictionary stateSaver) {
            base.Install(stateSaver);

            // OCX needs to run with regsvr, so false for the 2nd param.
            RunRegistration(OCX, false, true);
            // The Interops need regasm.
            RunRegistration(Office, true, true);
            RunRegistration(Word, true, true);
            RunRegistration(Excel, true, true);
        }

        public override void Uninstall(System.Collections.IDictionary savedState) {
            base.Uninstall(savedState);

            RunRegistration(OCX, false, false);
            RunRegistration(Office, true, false);
            RunRegistration(Word, true, false);
            RunRegistration(Excel, true, false);
        }

        public override void Rollback(System.Collections.IDictionary savedState) {
            base.Rollback(savedState);

            // Uninstall during the Rollback, just in case something happens in the installation.
            RunRegistration(OCX, false, false);
            RunRegistration(Office, true, false);
            RunRegistration(Word, true, false);
            RunRegistration(Excel, true, false);
        }

        public override void Commit(System.Collections.IDictionary savedState) {
            base.Commit(savedState);

            // Nothing needs to be done during Commit.
        }

        static void Main() { }

        /// <summary>
        /// A method to run either regasm or regsvr32 to register a given DLL or OCX.
        /// </summary>
        /// <param name="fileName">The name of the file to register.</param>
        /// <param name="regasm">True to run regasm, false to run regsvr32.exe.</param>
        /// <param name="install">True to install, false to uninstall.</param>
    private static void RunRegistration(string fileName, bool regasm, bool install)     {
            try {
                Process reg = new Process();

                string args = string.Empty;

                if (!install) {
                    // If we're not installing, set it to uninstall.
                    args += " -u ";
                }

                if (regasm) {
                    // Use System.Runtime... to get the latest operating directory where regasm would be located.
                    reg.StartInfo.FileName = Path.Combine(System.Runtime.InteropServices.RuntimeEnvironment.GetRuntimeDirectory(), "regasm.exe");
                }
                else {
                    reg.StartInfo.FileName = "regsvr32.exe";
                    // Run regsvr32 silently or else it displays a dialog that the OCX was registered successfully.
                    args += " /s ";
                }

                args += " \"" + Path.Combine(InstallationPath, fileName) + "\"";

                reg.StartInfo.Arguments = args;
                reg.StartInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
                reg.StartInfo.CreateNoWindow = true;
                reg.StartInfo.RedirectStandardOutput = true;

                reg.Start();
                reg.WaitForExit();
                reg.Close();
            }
            catch (Exception ex) {
                MessageBox.Show(ex.Message);
            }
        }
    }
}