Web Deploy: Majority of installations fail (Source file not found)

[instrumentally]

I recent started an email campaign to notify contacts of the availability of a new software product of mine. Hundreds of emails were sent out and I've received dozens of responses in the way of attempts to download the software product. This product's installation is created using the latest version of Setup Builder using Web Deploy.

When the installation is compiled, all goes well. The code is signed and the files are uploaded to our local server.

I can download and install the stub/deployment just fine. (But then again, I am only 10 feet away from the server, so packets have a short distance to travel).

The problem is that the majority of email recipients who successfully download the EXE stub and then launch it encounter "Source file not found" error messages at various stages of the install. There are 307 .bin files associated with the deployment stub. But rarely does anyone successfully get all 307 files without getting the dreaded "Source file not found" message. Some users get the error with _00002.bin. Others with _00005.bin. Others at _00053.bin. Etc. The only common thing between all the users is that they never get all the way through the installation.

This has turned out to be a disaster. According to the LOG file, 8 out of 8 different users failed to complete the web deployment.

The hosting server is a Windows 2016 server running IIS.

I feel that I will need to give up on using the web deployment method since this is killing the resources we put into the email campaign.

[linder]

Hello,

unfortunately, or fortunately, it is not caused by SetupBuilder at all. And nothing changed in the web module for years. It's definitely a problem on your end, I am sorry :-( Web Update and Web Install work absolutely rock solid. It powers tens of thousands web updates and web installs without any problem.

I am sorry you have to give up on web install. I am sure it's just a configuration problem on your server. "Source file not found" means the file was not available when the web update clients requested it. Perhaps you can see in your server logs what caused this.

BTW, our own web install for SetupBuilder (it's the same module you are using) handled quite a few thousands web installs during the last 48 hours.

Friedrich

[linder]

By the way, if you are interested, please send me your stub and I'll test it from our machines. We are quite a few thousand miles away (but in fact, this does not make any difference). Perhaps we can see where your server has a problem.

But I can guarantee it is not caused by SetupBuilder. 300 cluster files is a simple and small project. There are Web Updates and Installs with 2000+ files out there serving 10,000+ customers. So unfortunately, there is nothing we can do from the SetupBuilder side :-(

Friedrich

[linder]

I see you already had this same problem in August 2018:

http://www.lindersoft.com/forums/sho...9460#post89460
http://www.lindersoft.com/forums/sho...9471#post89471

IMO, your issue is caused by a server configuration problem. "Soure file not found" is identical to a typical "404 Page not found" error. This error message is a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) standard response code to indicate that the client was able to communicate with the server, but the server could not find what was requested.

Perhaps a typical "load balance configuration" problem.

Friedrich

[linder]

Hello again,

okay, please have a look at the attached screenshots. I have a full video of it if you are interested. I ran your Web Install and I am thousand miles away, located on another continent. There was not any problem - SetupBuilder installed (from the web) all your files successfully.

That means, your server was not under heavy load and was able to handle all requests. There was no "source file not found" / "404" error. Your product is ~400 MB, so perhaps your server can't handle the traffic if multiple users are downloading concurrently?

By the way, after reviewing your installation scenario, please allow me one question: why are you using Web Installation at all? As far as I can see, you always install all files. End users frequently do not need all the files contained in an installer (e.g. for updates). The Web Installation technology simplifies the user experience by first downloading a small "smart" installer which can retrieve just the pieces needed for the user's specific requirements. But if you always install all files, why don't you simply create a single-file setup.exe? I really do not see any advantage by using Web Installation in your specific case. Perhaps I am missing something.

And to work around your server issue and to stop the "source file not found" problem immediately, just unmark the "Enable Web Installation" feature in your SB project and recompile. SetupBuilder will generate a single-file installer with the same .exe name. Upload it to your site and you are done.

Friedrich

[instrumentally]

This issue has occurred with two totally different IIS servers. The issue existed with a Windows 2003 server and the issue continues with a Windows 2016 server. The IIS configuration are standard/default settings. If the default settings for a web site in IIS is to blame for my problems, then I believe your company needs to alert their customers of this issue and provide a fix. Just saying, "The problem is on your end, sorry" when the IIS servers are using default settings is disappointing.

Perhaps you can see in your server logs what caused this.

There is nothing in the server log that provides any clues. All I see is that the very last .bin file is never reached. You see _00001.bin downloaded just fine in the LOG file. You see _00002.bin downloaded just fine in the LOG file. You see _00003.bin downloaded just fine in the LOG file. And then that's it. No error codes. Just simply the .bin files stop being accessed by the stub EXE.

So the LOG files tell me nothing, and what I get from you is simply, "The problem is on your end, sorry."

[instrumentally]

Perhaps a typical "load balance configuration" problem.

There is no load issue on the server. The server is barely being used.

[instrumentally]

so perhaps your server can't handle the traffic if multiple users are downloading concurrently?

There were approx. 8 download attempts by 8 different users on the day in question. The odds of all 8 download attempts by 8 different users from 8 different locations ALL HAPPENING AT THE SAME TIME is about nil.

[instrumentally]

why are you using Web Installation at all?

Quite simple... Web spider search engines will find embedded EXE links in HTML pages and part of the spidering process, download the EXE in the process. This can lead to dozens to hundreds of unnecessary downloads of the EXE. If I have a 400MB EXE linked to a HTML page, then I run the risk of this useless bandwidth occurring. But if I use Web Deploy, and have only a 25K EXE stub, then the bandwidth usage is minimized since the search engine spider is highly unlikely to execute the downloaded stub.

[instrumentally]

just unmark the "Enable Web Installation" feature in your SB project and recompile. SetupBuilder will generate a single-file installer with the same .exe name.

I already did that shortly after I posted my original message. I simply could not afford wasting the email campaign resources by pointing interested respondents with the Web Deploy version.

Basically I am no forced to create a response arrangement where I send the respondent a HTML page that is not linked to any of my web site's pages. In this HTML file/page they will find a download link to the non-Web Deploy version. There is no way that I can make the 400mb EXE public as a result of this problem, because as I mentioned earlier, EXEs that are linked in public HTML files get downloaded by search engine spiders.