Dear VB Experts,

I'm having issues with reinstalling/updating an application on a client's computer after an initial install went okay. I'm trying to provide an update and the client gets the following detailed error message after the initial warning saying, "Application cannot be started. Contact the Application Vendor."

PLATFORM VERSION INFO
Windows : 5.1.2600.131072 (Win32NT)
Common Language Runtime : 2.0.50727.42
System.Deployment.dll : 2.0.50727.42 (RTM.050727-4200)
mscorwks.dll : 2.0.50727.42 (RTM.050727-4200)
dfdll.dll : 2.0.50727.42 (RTM.050727-4200)
dfshim.dll : 2.0.50727.42 (RTM.050727-4200)

SOURCES
Deployment url: file:///E:/FIRM.application

ERROR SUMMARY
Below is a summary of the errors, details of these errors are listed later in the log.
* Activation of E:\FIRM.application resulted in exception. Following failure messages were detected:
+ The referenced assembly is not installed on your system. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x800736B3)

COMPONENT STORE TRANSACTION FAILURE SUMMARY
No transaction error was detected.

WARNINGS
There were no warnings during this operation.

OPERATION PROGRESS STATUS
* [5/3/2006 2:07:16 PM] : Activation of E:\FIRM.application has started.

ERROR DETAILS
Following errors were detected during this operation.
* [5/3/2006 2:07:16 PM] System.Runtime.InteropServices.COMException
- The referenced assembly is not installed on your system. (Exception from HRESULT: 0x800736B3)
- Source: System.Deployment
- Stack trace:
at System.Deployment.Internal.Isolation.IStore.GetAssemblyInformation(UInt32 Flags, IDefinitionIdentity DefinitionIdentity, Guid& riid)
at System.Deployment.Internal.Isolation.Store.GetAssemblyManifest(UInt32 Flags, IDefinitionIdentity DefinitionIdentity)
at System.Deployment.Application.ComponentStore.GetSubscriptionStateInternal(DefinitionIdentity subId)
at System.Deployment.Application.SubscriptionStore.GetSubscriptionStateInternal(SubscriptionState subState)
at System.Deployment.Application.SubscriptionStore.CheckAndReferenceApplication(SubscriptionState subState, DefinitionAppId appId, Int64 transactionId)
at System.Deployment.Application.DownloadManager.DownloadDeploymentManifestDirectBypass(SubscriptionStore subStore, Uri& sourceUri, TempFile& tempFile, SubscriptionState& subState, IDownloadNotification notification, DownloadOptions options, ServerInformation& serverInformation)
at System.Deployment.Application.DownloadManager.DownloadDeploymentManifestBypass(SubscriptionStore subStore, Uri& sourceUri, TempFile& tempFile, SubscriptionState& subState, IDownloadNotification notification, DownloadOptions options)
at System.Deployment.Application.ApplicationActivator.PerformDeploymentActivation(Uri activationUri, Boolean isShortcut)
at System.Deployment.Application.ApplicationActivator.ActivateDeploymentWorker(Object state)

COMPONENT STORE TRANSACTION DETAILS
No transaction information is available.

I don't have a clue what the message is refering to as the application and ClickOnce Deployment contains all of the prerequisites to run the application. Anybody have the same problem and if so, what did you do to fix it? Any help would be GREATLY appreciated.

Tony

I think maybe somehow a referenced assembly has been deleted or removed from your deployment.

One way you could have done this is to go to the Application Files dialog and mark an assembly previously deployed as Excluded. Or, maybe someone deleted it off the drive.

You can kind of start to debug this by finding the installed app on your hard drive, type dir /s myapp.exe, and seeing if you can start it from your hard drive without launching it from the ClickOnce shortcut.