Thoughts about setup and deployment issues, WiX, XNA, the .NET Framework and Visual Studio
All postings are provided AS IS with no warranties, and confer no rights. Additionally, views expressed herein are my own and not those of my employer, Microsoft.
There has been some early information about Windows 7 presented at PDC 2008 this week. Of particular interest to me as a former member of the Media Center team is some detailed information about upcoming Windows 7 Media Center features. Here are a couple of links to some information that Charlie Owen posted on his blog about Media Center end-user features and developer/platform features:
If you're interested in Media Center and/or Media Center development and want to get an early preview of what is planned for Windows 7, I encourage you to check out the information in these posts.
A couple of new cumulative update package for Windows Media Center have been released this week.
The first is an update for Windows Vista Media Center that is called the October 2008 Cumulative Update for Media Center for Windows Vista and is also known as KB955519. It is available for download in x86 and x64 versions. It can be installed on systems running the original version of Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate Editions and the SP1 version of Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate Editions. This update includes all fixes previously included in the June 2008 Cumulative Update and some additional fixes described in the knowledge base article linked below. Notably, this update fixes a regression introduced in the June 2008 update that caused playback to resume if it was paused and then the screen saver started.
The second is an update that is called the Cumulative Update for Media Center TV Pack for Windows Vista and is also known as KB956147. It is available for download in x86 and x64 versions. It can only be installed on systems that include the Media Center TV Pack for Windows Vista.
Here are some links for the October 2008 Cumulative Update for Media Center for Windows Vista:
Here are some links for the Cumulative Update for Media Center TV Pack for Windows Vista:
A new cumulative update package for Windows Vista Media Center has been released this week. This update is called the June 2008 Cumulative Update for Media Center for Windows Vista and is also known as KB950126. It is available for download in x86 and x64 versions. It can be installed on systems running the original version of Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate Editions and the SP1 version of Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate Editions.
The June 2008 Cumulative Update includes the following fixes:
Here are some links for the June 2008 Cumulative Update:
Update: There is now a knowledge base article at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/954622 with more information and a workaround for the issue described in this blog post. I encourage you to take a look at that article before using the steps listed in this blog post.
Recently, I have heard from a few customers who have had an issue installing the Xbox 360 PC setup package in order to configure their Xbox 360 as a Windows Media Center Extender. I want describe the issue, what is happening behind the scenes and how to work around it in case anyone else runs into it in the future.
Description of the issue
The customers I talked to had all previously upgraded to Windows XP SP3, and when they attempted to run Xbox 360 PC setup afterwards, they received an error message that looks like the following:
There is a problem with the installation of Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005. Uninstall the update to Media Center Edition 2005 and then re-install the update from the Windows Update website. Then run Media Center Extender setup again.
How to diagnose the issue
In this case, the last entries in the main log file created by Xbox 360 PC setup (%windir%\dvcsetup.log from the list in this blog post) look like this:
11:11:11 AM : Verifying MCE version. 11:11:11 AM : OS is Emerald : Verifying Sessions QFE is installed. ***********************************************************ERROR***********************************************************Start conditions NOT met. 11:11:21 AM : Checking for generic error during affiliation... 11:11:21 AM : Turning off the InOOBE flag. WARNING: Error turning off the InOOBE flag. 11:11:21 AM : Exiting
11:11:11 AM : Verifying MCE version.
11:11:11 AM : OS is Emerald : Verifying Sessions QFE is installed.
***********************************************************ERROR***********************************************************Start conditions NOT met.
11:11:21 AM : Checking for generic error during affiliation...
11:11:21 AM : Turning off the InOOBE flag.
WARNING: Error turning off the InOOBE flag.
11:11:21 AM : Exiting
Root cause of the issue
I looked in the source code for this installer, and at this stage of setup, it is trying to verify that Windows hotfix KB895961 (codenamed the "Sessions QFE" in the log file snippet above) is installed on the system by checking the following registry value:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\HotFix\KB895961]Installed=1 (REG_DWORD)
In Windows XP SP3, the code that is a part of this hotfix is a part of the service pack and no longer needs to be installed via a separate hotfix package. As a result, that registry value ends up getting deleted by the XP SP3 installation process. To complicate things, it is not possible to simply re-install the version of the KB895961 hotfix package that is available as a prerequisite during Update Rollup 2 for Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 setup because that package only allows installing on Windows XP SP2.
How to work around the issue
The Media Center team is investigating options for posting an updated version of KB895961 that will allow installing on Windows XP SP3 in order to work around this Xbox 360 PC setup issue. In the meantime, you can use the following steps to manually add the registry value that Xbox 360 PC setup is using to detect whether or not KB895961 is installed and unblock the installation on a Windows XP SP3 system:
It is safe to manually add this registry value because the fixes that are a part of KB895961 were rolled up and included in Windows XP SP3. This registry value will simply prevent Xbox 360 PC setup from thinking that the system does not yet have KB895961.
Important note about non-Windows XP SP3 scenarios
Note - if you encounter this error on a Windows XP SP2 system (instead of a Windows XP SP3 system), then you should be able to use steps like the following to work around this error:
<update date="2/15/2010"> Added a link to a knowledge base article that has been subsequently written about this issue - http://support.microsoft.com/kb/954622 </update>
I just noticed an interesting post on Ian Dixon's blog that I wanted to link to here. Anthony Park has posted this announcement on his blog about the release of new version of the MyNetflix application for Windows Vista Media Center. The first version of MyNetflix was written as a hosted HTML application for Windows XP Media Center Edition by Ryan Hurst, but the new version was rewritten from scratch and uses Media Center Markup Language (MCML).
Here is a summary of key features offered by the 2.0 version of the MyNetflix application:
Here are some links with more information about MyNetflix 2.0:
If you're a NetFlix subscriber and use Windows Vista Media Center, I encourage you to try out the beta of MyNetflix 2.0.
A new cumulative update package for Windows Vista Media Center has been released this week. This update is called the February 2008 Cumulative Update for Media Center for Windows Vista and is also known as KB947172. It is available for download in x86 and x64 versions.
The February 2008 Cumulative Update includes the following fixes:
Here are some links for the February 2008 Cumulative Update:
Beta 4 of TV Toolbox for Windows Vista Media Center has been released recently on the MCEDev.com site. This beta includes bug fixes and functional changes that address issues reported by customers who used the first 3 beta versions. Here are some links to additional information about TV Toolbox:
If you are interested in editing and converting your recorded TV shows to other formats in Windows Vista Media Center, I encourage you to check out TV Toolbox.
Niall Ginsbourg announced the launch of his new Big Screen Global web site and the release of the Big Screen Photos v2 and Big Screen Weather v2 applications for Windows Vista Media Center.
I have been using the beta versions of a few of the Big Screen applications for a while and they're really nice. I encourage you to check out these links for additional information about the Big Screen product line:
Yesterday, I posted some information about a Group Policy settingthat can prevent Windows Media Center from launching on a Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate system. Since then, I have heard from a couple of people who have been receiving the same error message but who did not have this Group Policy setting enabled on their systems. After some further investigation, I found another possible cause of this type of error that I wanted to describe here as well.
To summarize some information from my previous post, it is possible that launching Windows Vista Media Center will fail and will instead display the following error message:
The dialog looks like this:
I looked at the startup code for Windows Media Center, and found that in addition to the Group Policy setting that I previously described, it is also possible for this error dialog to appear if Windows Media Center is marked as disabled in the Set Program Access and Computer Defaults control panel on Windows Vista.
You can use the following steps to enable Windows Media Center in the Set Program Access and Computer Defaults control panel if it is currently disabled:
Note - you do not have to select the radio button to the left of the Windows Media Center to make it the default media player if you don't want to, but the Enable check box must be checked or Windows Media Center will refuse to launch on your system.
What is happening behind the scenes
The Enable access to this program check box for the Windows Media Center Item in the Set Program Access and Computer Defaults control panel will result in the following value being changed in the registry on Windows Vista:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Clients\Media\Windows Media Center\InstallInfo]IconsVisible
If the IconsVisible value is set to 0, then Windows Media Center will not run on a Windows Vista system.
<update date="10/7/2011"> Fixed broken link to image embedded in this post. </update>
Recently, I was contacted by a customer who is running Windows Vista Home Premium, but who was unable to launch Windows Media Center. There was not a shortcut available on the Windows Vista start menu, and when they tried navigating directly to c:\Windows\eHome\ and running ehShell.exe directly, they received an error dialog with the following information:
In Windows Vista, a Group Policy setting was introduced to allow administrators to configure systems to not allow Windows Media Center to run. This setting was designed to be used in locked down environments such as corporate networks where Windows Media Center is not needed on a day-to-day basis. However, it is possible that this setting could end up getting configured on home systems as well.
If you see the above dialog when attempting to launch Windows Vista Media Center, you can use the following steps to disable the Windows Media Center Group Policy settings using the Group Policy Object Editor in Windows Vista:
If you see this dialog on your system, it is important to check both the Computer Configuration (per-machine) and User Configuration (per-user) locations for this setting because if either one of them is enabled, Windows Media Center will not launch and will display the above dialog.
Behind the scenes, the Group Policy Object Editor sets the following registry values:
The logic for this setting is backwards from what you might typically expect because the setting indicates whether or not Windows Media Center should be disabled (as opposed to enabled). If the setting is enabled, it means that Windows Media Center will not be allowed to run. The MediaCenter registry value will be set to 1 in that case. If the setting is disabled or not configured, it means that Windows Media Center will be allowed to run. If the setting is disabled, the MediaCenter registry value will be set to 0. If the setting is not configured at all, the MediaCenter registry value will not exist on the system.
Where to find additional information
This Windows Media Center Group Policy setting and others that are supported in Windows Vista are described in more detail in the Windows Vista Group Policy Settings Reference. This spreadsheet is available for download at http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=41dc179b-3328-4350-ade1-c0d9289f09ef.
Ian Dixon posted an item on his blog indicating that the voting for the Media Center Show Awards 2007 is now open. This year, the Media Center Show Awards has the following categories:
I encourage you to visit the voting page at http://thedigitallifestyle.com/awards07/default.aspx and submit your votes for the Media Center Show Awards 2007.
A while back, I posted some links to EPG data error reporting sites for Windows XP Media Center Edition (here and here). Recently, I have heard from a couple of folks who have had trouble reporting EPG issues for Windows Vista Media Center using these sites.
The Windows Media Center team is aware of these submission issues and is working on getting them fixed. In the meantime, you can use the forum at http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/90/ShowForum.aspx to report EPG data issues for Windows Vista Media Center.
If you use this forum, please make sure to use the template that is listed in the post pinned to the top of this forum (also located at this link - http://thegreenbutton.com/forums/thread/201523.aspx).
Ian Dixon has published episode 126 of the Media Center Show, and Niall Ginsbourg is Ian's guest on this episode. Niall has developed several Windows Media Center applications (such as Big Screen Photos and Big Screen Headlines among others). In addition, he is a community development expert on the Windws Media Center Sandbox forums.
Niall discusses several Media Center development topics with Ian on the show, including best practices he applies while developing applications and some information about the applications he has created or is currently working on.
You can check out the following links for more information about Media Center Show episode 126:
I encourage you to check out this episode of the Media Center Show if you are interested in developing applications for Windows Vista Media Center.
A new cumulative update package for Windows Vista Media Center has been released this week. This update is called the October 2007 Cumulative Update for Media Center for Windows Vista and is also known as KB941229. It is available for download in x86 and x64 versions.
The October 2007 Cumulative Update includes the following fixes:
Here are some links for the October 2007 Cumulative Update:
In addition, there are 3 other cumulative updates being released for Windows Vista at the same time as the October 2007 Cumulative Update for Media Center. They help address issues reported by customers related to reliability, compatibility, stability, security and performance of various features in Windows Vista. The following links contain more information about the fixes included in each of these additional updates and allow you to directly download and install them if you choose to:
As announced last night on the Media Center Sandbox blog, a new application for Windows Vista Media Center has been released. The application, named PowerPlaylist, adds a custom strip to the Windows Vista Media Center start menu with up to five tiles. Each tile represents an audio, slideshow and/or visualization combination which will start when the tile is selected. PowerPlaylist is configured via an XML data file, and the application includes an editor to customize the information in the data file, including the title of the custom Start Menu strip and the name, image, audio source, slideshow folder and visualization for each tile.
PowerPlaylist has been released on CodePlex, and you can download x86 and/or x64 MSI-based installers if you want to try out the application. You can also download source code (licensed with the Microsoft Permissive License) if you want to see how the application works behind the scenes, modify it to add features, fix bugs, etc.
Here are some links for more information about PowerPlaylist:
Earlier today, I posted some information about the Windows Media Center Internet TV beta that was released to Windows Vista Media Center users in the United States last night. Today, I found a blog post at http://windowsvistablog.com/blogs/windowsexperience/archive/2007/09/27/streaming-internet-content-with-internet-tv-beta-to-windows-media-center.aspx that describes the functionality available in this beta in more detail.
I encourage you to check out the feature descriptions listed there. Better yet, if you are in the United States and have Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate, launch Media Center and check it out for yourself from the TV + Movies strip on the start menu.
A beta of a new feature for Windows Vista Media Center was announced yesterday at the DigitalLife conference, and I wanted to post a link to it here for folks who haven't yet heard about it. The feature, known as the Windows Media Center Internet TV Beta, will be available within Windows Vista Media Center on systems in the United States starting this morning, September 28, 2007.
Windows Media Center Internet TV will allow you to stream free ad-supported video content from MSN video on Media Center PCs or on Media Center Extender devices. Types of content that will be available include the following:
The music concerts and movie trailers will be presented in a hi-resolution format, and the team is working on adding more hi-resolution content in the future. You can read more details about this beta and some of the content that will be available for streaming in this press release.
The Windows Media Center Internet TV beta will be automatically downloaded if you opted in to receive CD album art, media information for DVDs and movies and Internet Services during the initial Media Center setup wizard that appeared the first time you launched Media Center on your Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate system. It will appear as a new tile named "internet tv" in the TV + Movies strip on the Windows Vista Media Center start menu after it has been downloaded to your system.
If you did not previously opt in for automatic downloads, you can opt in by doing that sense:
There will also be a public beta site for Windows Media Center Internet TV on the Microsoft Connect site. You will be able to submit bug reports and other feedback about this beta on this site once it is available.
A new beta version of TV Toolbox for Windows Vista Media Center has been released recently on the MCEDev.com site. This beta includes bug fixes and functional changes that address issues reported by customers who used the first 2 beta versions. Here are some links to additional information about TV Toolbox:
I know I'm a little late posting about this, but better late than never. Niall Ginsbourg has posted some information about an updated version of Big Screen Headlines that he has been working on recently. This application is an RSS feed browser for Windows Vista Media Center. You can check out Niall's post at http://mobilewares.spaces.live.com/Blog/cns!78533A1A2E078194!597.entry. It contains screenshots and descriptions of several key new features in Big Screen Headlines v2. Here is a summary of some of the changes:
I encourage you to check out the blog post, and also try out the beta when it is available (it sounds like the beta is imminent based on Niall's comments in the post).
Question:
I have a computer that is running Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005. When I press the green button on my Media Center remote control, it will not launch Media Center for me. I can use the mouse to launch Media enter, and after that the remote control will work fine. Even if I close Media Center, I can re-open it by using the green button on my remote control once I have launched Media Center at least once. However, if I reboot my computer, the same thing happens again.
Why is my system acting like this, and is there a way I can fix it so that the green button on my remote control will work all the time without needing to start Media Center manually with the mouse the first time?
Answer:
There is an application named ehTray that normally runs in the background on a Windows Media Center PC that listens for the green button on the remote to let you start Media Center. By default, when installing Windows XP Media Center Edition, the ehTray application is configured to start each time Windows starts. In addition, if it is not running when you start Media Center for the first time, Media Center will launch it for you.
It sounds like the registry entry to start that service when Windows starts was removed from this system. The following steps can be used to create a registry value that will cause the ehTray application to run each time Windows is started so that the green button on a Media Center remote control will work without needing to first launch Media Center manually:
Note: On Windows Vista, the configuration of the ehTray application has changed a little bit. The registry setting to automatically start ehTray when Windows starts is located under HKEY_CURRENT_USER instead of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, and it will not appear by default when you install Windows Vista. However, the green button on a Media Center remote will work correctly on a default install of Windows Vista Home Premium or Ultimate editions, even if you have not yet launched Media Center for the first time.
<update date="9/4/2007"> Updated the not about Windows Vista behavior because I misunderstood the behavior on a newly installed OS. Thanks to Fu for pointing this out to me. </update>
Recently, I heard from a customer who has a system with Update Rollup 2 for Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 and a localization pack that is used to add support for one of the new locales that was added in the Update Rollup 2 product. However, the customer ran into a problem that caused them to need to re-install their OS. After re-installing the OS, they were unable to re-install the localization pack and their Windows and Windows Media Center UI displayed in English instead of the language of the localization pack. Attempting to re-run the localization pack setup displayed an error stating "Installation of more than one Localization Pack for Update Rollup 2 for Windows Media Center 2005 is not supported."
If you run into a similar scenario and need to be able to re-install a localization pack for Update Rollup 2 for Windows XP Media Center 2005, you can use steps like the following:
You should be able to re-run setup for the localization pack after completing the above steps to clean off the previous installation of the localization pack.
Steven Harding recently posted an update about a couple of the projects he's been working on in this post on his Digital Lifestyle Developer Blog, and I wanted to link to it here and encourage folks to check out these applications.
Updated alpha version of Yougle Vista
The first is an updated alpha version of Yougle Vista. You can use Yougle Vista to browse and view community video from sources such as YouTube, Google Video, MSN Soapbox and others. You can find information about Yougle Vista at http://www.push-a-button.com.au/products/mce/vista/youglevista/index.php.
As stated in the blog post, the Yougle Vista application is still in alpha and you may encounter some bugs, in particular on 64-bit versions of Windows Vista. I've been using Yougle Vista for a few weeks on my 32-bit Windows Vista Ultimate system and the only real issue I had was the initial hurdle of getting it running in the first place. Once I installed a recent build of the FFDShow codec pack, it worked fine in most scenarios. I highly encourage you to check out this application, even in alpha form.
Poker game timer
The second application is a poker game timer. It can be downloaded from http://www.push-a-button.com.au/downloads/BlindTimerSetup.msi and keeps track of blinds, antes, and time until they will increase. It includes spoken announcements of blind increases and warnings as the timer is about to expire. I'm not a big poker player myself, but if you are, this application could come in handy for you.
A new beta version of the TV Toolbox application for Windows Vista Media Center has been released on the MCEDev.com site. You can check out the following links for more information about TV Toolbox:
A news item was recently posted on the MCEDev.com web site that I wanted to draw your attention to if you haven't seen it already. The post, located at http://www.mcedev.com/News.aspx?id=b88920c9-57a4-44fc-8feb-78c18b596fa8, announces a publicly downloadable beta of a Windows Vista Media Center application named TV Toolbox. This application is a new version of the Media Center Cutter application that has been available for a while for Windows XP Media Center Edition and that was previously announced with feature details and screenshots on Niall's Big Screen Blog back in March.
This application allows you to do things like the following from within Windows Media Center:
I encourage you to check out the following locations for more information about TV Toolbox:
Olcay Buyan, a developer from MceDev.com, has posted an introduction and some screenshots for a new Windows Vista Media Center application that is currently being developed. The application is an interactive cookbook, and in this post, it is combined with a kitchen-based Media Center display so you can use it to look up recipes while you are working in the kitchen.
You can check out screenshots of the application and the kitchen-based Media Center systems at http://www.mcedev.com/News.aspx?id=744daf2c-78a3-46d3-b1e7-8cf214d2d14f.
Hopefully there will be a downloadable version of the application available soon so I can try it out on my Media Center system.