Deploying Rhino - Technique for silent/scripted installs, details of folders and registry, etc.

PROBLEM:

Missing toolbars and no plug-ins loaded on Vista

A small number of users have reported that installing Rhino V4 (SR2 and newer) on Vista has resulted in no plug-ins and no toolbars loaded unless logged in and running as the Administrator. This has been more common on Vista Home Premium systems, but has been reported on all flavors of Vista. Most users do not report this problem and we have not been able to duplicate the problem here in the Rhino Development Team.

SOLUTION:

Users have reported that if they turn off User Account Control (Control Panel - User Accounts), and temporarily disable any antivirus and system protection software before running the Rhino installation again, solves the problem. After reinstalling and running Rhino once, you should restart your antivirus and system protection tools. You can turn UAC back on if you want to as well.

Added 5 Mar 2009 - John Brock

Close Rhino 3.0

Run this utility: http://en.wiki.mcneel.com/content/upload/files/Rhino3_Registry_Repair.zip while Rhino is closed.

Restart Rhino

The utility can delete the following key in the registry to make Rhino “forget” some settings that make the toolbars not dock correctly.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\McNeel\Rhinoceros\3.0\Scheme: Default\Control bar manager

- to be used after upgrading cards and drivers

Close Rhino 3.0

Run this utility: http://en.wiki.mcneel.com/content/upload/files/Rhino3_Registry_Repair.zip while Rhino is closed.

Restart Rhino

The utility can delete the following key in the registry to make Rhino “forget” old OpenGL display settings

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\McNeel\Rhinoceros\3.0\Scheme: Default\Options\OpenGL

PROBLEM: This can be caused by a corrupt installer cache on your computer.

SOLUTION: Follow the instructions in the article Manually Uninstalling Rhino 4.0

PROBLEM: This can be caused by a corrupt installer cache on your computer.

SOLUTION: Follow the instructions in the article Manually Uninstalling Rhino 5.0

PROBLEM:

When installing Rhino 4.0, a message appears that says “please wait while the installer finishes determining your disk space requirements”. This dialog box never disappears.

CAUSE:

The Windows Installer engine tries to determine if there is enough disk space on all your drives to install Rhino. For some reason, this process takes a very long time, or never completes. The real cause is buried somewhere in Microsoft's Windows Installer engine.

SOLUTION:

Run the installer from the command prompt:

msiexec /i Rhino4_Setup.msi /qr

PROBLEM:

The Index tab of the Rhino Help or BonusToolsHelp window is blank

for low-privilege user logins in Windows 2000.

SOLUTION:

This is a permissions problem that interacts with a bug in Windows 2000.

Here's how to fix it without changing the permissions on Program Files folders.

Just have an administrator delete the file Rhino.GID in the …Program Files\Rhino\English\Help folder, and while you are at it, delete the RhinoBonusTools.GID

Then have the administrator log out (don't run the Help yet, or it will recreate the GID file for the administrator).

Have the low-privilege user log in. The Index tab should now populate (and a GID file is created somewhere in the user's personal files area.)

This trick is not needed on Windows XP, Microsoft fixed the bug.

Another way it can be fixed on Windows 2000

is to add the permission “Write” for Users on the …Rhino\English\Help folder

Question: “Can I get Rhino v5 WIP if I own Rhino 3 but not Rhino 4?”
Answer: Currently you do need to be a registered owner of V4 to participate in the V5 development process.
In addition, a version of V4 must be installed on the same machine with the install of V5.

Question: “Can I install or uninstall the Rhino 5 WIP/Beta and keep my Rhino 4 install intact?”
Answer: Yes, but with one important condition - read on

The Rhino V5 WIP/Beta is a completely separate installation from V4 - in principle, at least*. However, it uses the same license manager as V4. Problems can arise if you decide to uninstall Rhino 5, the V4 license manager gets uninstalled in the process, and your V4 installation will stop working.

In order to prevent this from happening, if you decide to uninstall a V5 WIP, first COPY the files McNeelLM.exe and RhinoLM.exe to a safe location, then uninstall Rhino 5 and then copy them back to the original location.

In Windows Vista or 7 the license manager is located at:
C:\Program Files (x86)\Common Files\McNeel Shared\License Manager (64 bit)
or
C:\Program Files\Common Files\McNeel Shared\License Manager (32 bit)

*You also want to be VERY careful with plug-ins, toolbars, etc. that might be shared between V4 and V5 - either consciously or inadvertently. This has been known to cause problems…

Question: “Can I have both the 32 bit and 64 bit versions of Rhino 5 installed on the same computer?”
Answer: Yes, no problem, except for the license manager issue as above.

Question: “I just downloaded the lates R5 64 bit build. When I open it to install, it tells me that it could not be opened and to contact the vendor.”
Answer: Kaspersky Antivirus (2010) has been identified as stopping the installation. It looks as though the Rhino 5 installer is firing up the Heuristic scanner used by Kaspersky which kills the install. Turn off the scanner temporarily and the install should complete without issues.

Question: I tried to uninstall Rhino 4.0, but an error occurred and Rhino could not be removed.

Answer: Manually remove Rhino 4.0.

Question: I tried to uninstall Rhino 5.0, but an error occurred and Rhino could not be removed.

Answer: Manually remove Rhino 5.0.

Question: “What do I need to do to get my Rhino 4.0 Upgrade to install?”

Answer: The Rhino 4.0 Upgrade installer will install if one of the following is true. It is checked in order:

Rhino 3.0 is installed

Rhino 2.0 is installed

Rhino 1.1 is installed

Rhino 1.0 is installed

Rhino 3.0 CD is inserted into the CD drive during installation

Rhino 2.0 CD is inserted into the CD drive during installation

Rhino 1.1 CD is inserted into the CD drive during installation

Rhino 1.0 CD is inserted into the CD drive during installation

Transferring personalized settings from one Rhino 4 install to another

Question: I've got a new computer and I want to install Rhino version X SR Y. I have always purchased upgrade versions of Rhino. Do I have to install ALL previous versions and sucessive service packs??

Answer: Simply install the last upgrade version you have on CD. During the install, you will be asked to insert the CD of a previous version to validate that you have it, but it is not necessary to actually INSTALL the previous versions. Once you have installed the last CD version, proceed to install the latest Service Release - it is not necessary to install previous ones.

These installers are downloadable and will only install if you have a version of the product already installed. Service Releases are identified two ways: the SR number, like SR3 or SR4b; and the date, which is coded into the name of the download file like 20050729, meaning July 29, 2005.

Once you have the software installed, you can see the date and the SR number by viewing the “about” information, which appears on the “splash screen” when you start Rhino, or can be viewed by doing Rhino > Help > About Rhinoceros.

For Flamingo, do the FlamingoAbout command. For Bongo, do the BongoAbout command.

The quick way is to use the Check for Updates service. In Rhino, pull down the Help menu, and pick Check for Updates. If you are connected to the internet, the McNeel web servers will offer the correct Service Release if there is one newer than your software. For Flamingo, pull down the Raytrace or Photometric menu and pick Check for Updates. For Bongo, pull down the Bongo menu and pick Check for Updates.

The “Add or Remove Programs” entry in the Control Panel in Windows is reporting all Service Releases as an installed program, each using approx. 250MB of disk space. This is somewhat misleading. Windows reports the total as though all installed files are added on to the existing installation even though many if not all files are actually overwritten on install. Do not use the “Add or Remove Programs” to remove older Service Releases of Rhino 4.0.

See this page DebugInstaller for instructions on how to generate a logfile of the error and get Technical Support involved.

Question: I get “Error 1327. Invalid Drive (E:, F:, etc)” when installing

Cause: Your user account has settings indicating that one or more non-existent drives should be used for special folders such as “My Documents”

Solution:

1. From the Start menu, click Run.
2. Type RegEdit, then click Run
3. Browse to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Folders
4. Look for directories listed that contain the drive letter mentioned in the error from the installer. Change them to point to a valid drive and folder.
5. Browse to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders
6. Look for directories listed that contain the drive letter mentioned in the error from

Note: This method, or task contains steps that tell you how to modify the registry. However, serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Therefore, make sure that you follow these steps carefully. For added protection, back up the registry before you modify it. Then, you can restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up and restore the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

How to back up and restore the registry in Windows

Question: I get “Error 1327. An error occurred during the installation of assembly “Microsoft.VC80.CRT, …”

Cause: This is a bug in the Microsoft C++ 2005 Redistributable Package

Solution:

1. On Windows Vista or Windows 7, From the Start menu, type Features.
2. Click Turn Windows Features On or Off
3. In the Windows Features dialog box, select the check box labeled Windows Communication Foundation HTTP Activation:
4. 
5. Click OK

If you are unable to enable this feature, or if the Windows Features dialog box appears and is empty, then your installation of Windows is corrupt and needs to be repaired. Please contact Microsoft Support for more assistance.

More Details: People who get this error while installing Rhino are also unable to install the Microsoft C++ 2005 Redistributable Package directly from Microsoft. Therefore, this is a problem with Windows and the Microsoft Redistributable Package, not with Rhino's installer.

Question: A message “Could not open key: UNKNOWN\Components\(lots of letters and numbers). Error 1402. Verify that you have sufficient access to that key, or contact your support personnel.”

Cause: One or more registry keys in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\S-1-5-<numbers>\Components key has incorrect permissions.

Solution: WARNING: The following procedure involves editing the Windows Registry. Incorrect editing of the registry can damage your computer and cause it to not start. If you are not comfortable performing the following steps, please contact McNeel Support.

1. Download psexec from Microsoft TechNet, and extract the contents to your desktop.
2. Open a Windows command shell
3. Change directories to your desktop.
4. In the command shell, enter: psexec -i -d -s c:\windows\regedit.exe This causes Windows to run the registry editor with the permissions of the System account - an account even more powerful than Administrator.
5. Browse to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\
6. Right-click the UserData folder, then click Permissions…
7. In the Permissions for UserData dialog box, click Advanced
8. Ensure that “Administrators” has “Full Control” Permissions in this folder, and that “Users” has “Read” Permissions. There will be other user permissions, too - but Administrators and Users are what matter most.
9. Select the Replace all child object permissions with inheritable permissions from this object
10. Click OK twice to apply permissions
11. Install Rhino again.