12.0.1 Looks like a mess

[IanF]

Microsoft Autoupdater alerted me to the 12.0.1 update last night. So I
went ahead and ran it. The install got maybe three-quarters of the way
through then told me there was a problem with the media I was
installing from. My guess was probably a corrupt download.

Today I tried to run Entourage and it repeatedly crashes with the
following message
"Microsoft Entourage has encountered a problem and needs to close. We
are sorry for the inconvenience". The "More Information" seems says
the Entourage version it is trying to run is 12.0.1.080305.

Running the upgrade via MAU now refuses because it can't find an
installed copy of Office.

So I come here for help and I find numerous other problems with the
12.0.1.

This is pitiful. Sorry Microsoft - no other word for it. Have bought
your software for many machines over many years. You owe us better
than this.

 

[IanF]

And it gets worse. Remove Office crashes unexpectedly. I can't remove
Office 2008 and reinstall. I guess I'll look into how to remove it
manually.

But no time to do that now - I have to get on with some real work. And
here's the irony - I'll be using Office 2004 for that.

Have held back from upgrading my work MacBook (where I need to be
productive) to Office 2008 until I prove to myself on my home machine
that Office 2008 is a) an improvement and b) stable. Definitely not
convinced yet.

 

[Diane Ross]

Microsoft Autoupdater alerted me to the 12.0.1 update last night. So I
went ahead and ran it. The install got maybe three-quarters of the way
through then told me there was a problem with the media I was
installing from. My guess was probably a corrupt download.

Today I tried to run Entourage and it repeatedly crashes with the
following message
"Microsoft Entourage has encountered a problem and needs to close. We
are sorry for the inconvenience". The "More Information" seems says
the Entourage version it is trying to run is 12.0.1.080305.

Try this....

Go to Library/Receipts folder and remove any Microsoft packages.

Download and install using the standalone updater.

Mactopia Downloads <http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.aspx>

See this article for more help:

<http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/2008/03/entourage_still_states_1200.html>

 

[Matthew Gardiner]

Hi,

Excuse me, have you ever attempted to ask yourself how the majority of us
here don't have a single problem, and yet you seem to have every problem
imaginable?

Office 2008 was an easy install, I installed the update, and voila,
everything works. Its interesting, every single person who has complained
about Office 2008 is run third party crap like addons, tweakers, modifiers,
boosters and other garbage.

Keep your installation vanilla and you won't have problems.

Matthew

 

[Mr. Strat]

Excuse me, have you ever attempted to ask yourself how the majority of us
here don't have a single problem, and yet you seem to have every problem
imaginable?

No problems here either.

Office 2008 was an easy install, I installed the update, and voila,
everything works. Its interesting, every single person who has complained
about Office 2008 is run third party crap like addons, tweakers, modifiers,
boosters and other garbage.

Keep your installation vanilla and you won't have problems.

Some people feel compelled to download and install every bit of
crapware they can find...move the locations of default
installations...and then complain when things don't work right.

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

and then complain when things don't work right.

Well I wouldn't be too quick to judge. There are serious issues for a
*number* of users with this update.

Corentin

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

Hi,

Excuse me, have you ever attempted to ask yourself how the majority of us
here don't have a single problem, and yet you seem to have every problem
imaginable?

Hum, you should check the varous Office newsgroups.
There has been a LOT of reports of issues with the 12.0.1 updates.
The Entourage group reports a worrysome number of ENtourage still at
12.0.0 after the update and I have read half a dozen reports of "the
updater won;t install" reports as well (and working on different
machines here, I've experienced both myself).


For this specific issue, you can always try to use Pacifist to
force-install the update. At worse, you'd have to uninstall, reinstall
and re-update Office.

Corentin

 

[IanF]

Thanks Corentin for bringing a mature perspective to this. My point
was indeed based on seeing the number of posts with issues about the
12.0.1 update.

For the most part my experience over the years that Office for Mac has
been a great and professionally managed product. So my point was that
12.0.1 doesn't hit the high standard that Microsoft has set.

On the original problem I raised - when I had time to get back to it I
simply removed the Office 2008 folder from Applications - reinstalled
from the DVD. That took me into Autoupdater and the 12.0.1 update. The
update ran fine - other than the "time remaining" was wildly
inaccurate. It ran through what it said was going to take 8 minutes in
about 2 and then spent about 10 minutes going through the updates for
each application telling me there was "less than a minute remaining".

As in my original post I'm guessing a corrupted download was the
problem. though one would expect Autoupdate to include checks for the
integrity of the download before proceeding. If I download open source
software and I ignore MD5 checksums etc - fair enough - I do so at my
own risk. However, an updater such as AutoUpdater packaged for the
average consumer should do that for me.

Kudos too to Microsoft that my Entourage database survived these
glitches in the upgrade without having to restore it from a backup.

What was most unhelpful in this were those who jumped immediately to
conclusions that the problems were due to many additions and flaky
pieces of software on my system. Sorry I have none of those - just a
pretty much vanilla install.

Five stars to the MVPs - you clearly didn't get that title for nothing!

 

[IanF]

Oh - and meant to mention that this brings back memories of a previous
Mac Office update - the release of the Palm conduits a few years back
(pre iSync). The update was posted - was flaky - then went away again
- then came back working OK for the most part.

That kind of thing happens now and again. It's our prerogative to call
it when it does. Thanks for these groups to allow that to happen.

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

As in my original post I'm guessing a corrupted download was the
problem.

I doubt that. The file wouldn't decompress properly and that would be
the end of it,

Corentin

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

What was most unhelpful in this were those who jumped immediately to
conclusions that the problems were due to many additions and flaky
pieces of software on my system. Sorry I have none of those - just a
pretty much vanilla install.

It was unlikely anyway. The updater is a .mpkg using the Apple Installer
to perform the upgrade. I don't know any thrid party additions that
interfere with that (you can bypass it and mess around with Pacifist,
but you would have mentioned it).


Corentin


PS: and Oh, BTW, I *do* have a LOT of third party apps on my drive
myself. It still doesn't mean it's a mess and I don't know what I'm
doing :->

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

That kind of thing happens now and again. It's our prerogative to call
it when it does. Thanks for these groups to allow that to happen.

Bugs and error happens. From every company (Apple had serious issues
with 10.4.10 wiping out the Rosetta environment didn't they??).

Corentin

 

[IanF]

Bugs and error happens. From every company (Apple had serious issues

with 10.4.10 wiping out the Rosetta environment didn't they??).

Is that right? Survived that one!

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur]

Is that right? Survived that one!

The problem was triggered by launching another application that needed
prebinding as the installer was installing related resources.
It hit quite a few people, wiping out Rosetta.
In general, it's good karma not to do *anythying* as such a major update
is being installed.

Leopard found a way around the issue: it forces you to restart to
install the update: the system logs you out, preventing you from doing
anythign "bad", installs the update and reboots.

Corentin