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I have a business application I am setting up to deploy using MSIX. I have a test installer project that has been working for several months and I am now attempting to setup a production version but have come across an issue where the .appinstaller fails but the .msixbundle will install the app.

The Setup:

The application I am deploying is a WPF .Net Core 3.1 application. There are 2 MSIX installer projects in the solution, one for test environment and one for Production (I know this is not the best but that is what I have at the moment). I have configured the Test Installer project to deploy the debug version of the app and the Production installer project is configured to deploy the release version of the app. They have different update URL's and different shared folder where the updates are saved. Other than that the installer projects should be the same.

I have a pair (Test & Prod) ASP .Net Core websites setup to host the app updates and installer websites, they are configured to statically host the update folder.

I am testing on a Win 10 2004 machine.

The Issue:

The issue is with the production installer project. After I publish, if I click on the 'Get The App' link from the installer website it will download the .appinstaller file and open it in the Windows App Installer. I then click on install and get a not so helpful error message shown below.

enter image description here

What I have checked

  1. Given I have 2 MSIX projects, one working and one not, I checked for differences between them. The only thing I can see is the broken on deploys the release version of the app while the other deploys the debug version
  2. I tried to run the .msixbundle directly from the shared folder where the updates are published and that worked fine. This leads me to believe that the issue is related to how the .appinstaller links to the .msixbundle
  3. I checked that the update files are accessible from the web address by copying the uri from the .appinstaller file and pasting that into a web browser. This resulted in the .msixbundle being downloaded and installing correctly.
  4. I have read the troubleshooting docs (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/win32/appxpkg/troubleshooting?redirectedfrom=MSDN and https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/msix/app-installer/troubleshoot-appinstaller-issues)
  5. I have checked the eventviewer. I noticed this event at the same time the install failed. enter image description here
  6. Directly running the .appinstaller from the shared folder results in the same error.
  7. Using the package bundle link on the website (under the additional links) will download the .msixbundle and install correctly.

I am not sure where else to look or what else I could do to resolve this issue.

Brett Manners
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2 Answers2

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Had the same issue. (Winforms, Net48, wapproj, x86) Couldnt solve ist also. Just installed the package on a "fresh machine" (vm) and it worked. So I'm guessing its not "your code" ist some "unclean installation state" on this specific machine.

Kind regards, Remo

Remo Oser
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There is a service in windows called DoSvc which is a special appinstaller breaking service, designed to make sure app installation never goes smoothly. If you have any issue with installing an appx package that can not be reproduced on another machine it is worth restarting this service as that often helps.

See AppInstaller XML Issue for further details (not the same issue but similar).

user3190036
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