msi asking for CD

[randle]

I'm having some fun packaging up LEGO Mindstorms NXT but managed to get there in the end and there's even a separate msi for the drivers provided on the CD which is great although i need help with editing the drivers msi. The msi installs fine when executed from the CD but when copied to the server and run from there it prompts for the CD! This is obviously coded into the msi somewhere but am unsure where to look. Any ideas? LEGO tech support are hopeless.

[Joanne]

have you copied everything from the cd into one folder?

[randle]

Yes but this is a self contained msi so all files are included within it

[Joanne]

note down what it wants from the cd, and use wininstall to edit the msi. Find the file and try and change the drive letter it picks the file up from... perhaps?

[Michael]

Do you have view hidden files enabled? It does seem odd it's still asking for a CD. Kind of defeats the objective having an MSI to distribute altogether!?

 

For experimental purposes, have you tried mounting the MSI into a Virtual CD application?

[randle]

That's the problem. There's no particular file, it just says

The feature you are trying to use is on a CD-ROM or other removable disk that is not available. Insert the 'LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT Driver ' disk and click OK. Use source: Disk1

 

Thinking about it now it seems that the msi maybe just points to another location on the CD but have opened the msi and had a look about and this seems to contain all relevant files!!

 

Update: If i change the source to the msi then it installs fine so is just a matter of changing the source but don't know where in the msi this is!!

Edited March 18, 2008 by randle

[Joanne]

sounds very strange.

 

can you create a virtual cd and get it to point to there... or is that just another silly idea of mine?

[Michael]

I think I would go back to Lego Technical support, seeing as your establishment have purchased the product.

 

Why not drop them an e-mail with the error message and give them a link to this page?

[randle]

I've already tried and it seemed they didn't even know what an msi was!! I thought maybe it wasn't even worth the hassle in the end.

 

Anyway i've made progress. Using ORCA i found "Disk 1" in the Media table so exchanged this with my packages dir path and the msi now executes fine although i need take away the specific path name as my packages are replicated over Three servers for load balancing so need a variable name in the place of a specific drive. Currently i have the path "Q:\Applications\LEGO Mindstorms NXT Driver\" So need something like %servername% but not sure what i can use! Any ideas?

[Michael]

Use a UNC path? \\servername\Applications\LEGO Mindstorms NXT Driver\

[randle]

I have 3 Servers so don't want to specify a specific server although i could just have 3 different msi's with the relevant server name in the path. Isn't ideal but will work.

[randle]

Well that was a surprise. I just took out any reference to a path from these entries and the msi still works so looks like i've got it doing what i want it to.

[buzzard]

ahh this hopefully will be what I'm after!! what LEGO have sent us back after a few emails is

 

Thank you for contacting the LEGO Education Technical Support line.

Your customer number is XXXXXXXXXX

 

Unfortunately we are not able to support installation of the software across a network due to many variables involved in this. We therefore recommend standalone installation only.

 

However, on the software disc, located in the folder called 'bin', there is a file called 'silent_install.txt', which may be of help.

 

Alternatively you may wish to visit one of the Internet forums.

 

Instructions on how to do a silent install can be found in the file 'silent_install.txt', which is located in the folder 'Bin' on the LEGO Mindstorms NXT education CD.

 

For further information or support please contact your distributor

 

Nice for a site licenced app!!

[randle]

I've found this to be the attitude of a lot of software vendors unfortunately.