COM Add In Deployment

[Jon Raynor]

I have created a COM Add In using the Shared Add-In in the Extensibility
project types in Visual Studio 2005. I used the connect.cs shell and added
code for the appropriate methods as needed.

Everything works great on my machine. I am having issues deploying to other
machines. The project automatically created the setup project for me and I
can install and uninstall on my local machine and the addin appears and
dissappears, but if I take the setup and run it on another machine, the
install works fine and the dll(s) get installed, but the COM add-in is not
loading. I believe I am missing a step during the install. Register for COM
interop is on and I do see the registry entry in HKEY Current User on both
machines.

What step am I missing?

I attempted to regasm the dll but I got an error saying the Extensibility
was missing.

Thanks,

Jon Raynor

 

[Austin Myers]

Several things to consider.

First and most importantly, Shared Add-in is no longer supported at all.
Using it will surely leave you high and dry at some point. Next, when doing
a Shared add-in you must install the correct PIA (Primary Interop
Assemblies) on the client machine. Correct meaning each version of PPT had
different ones and PPT 2000 has none at all. Next comes altering settings
in the CAG and making changes in the registries security settings so you can
make the needed changes to actually load the add-in. If you want to do it
for Windows Vista there are a whole bunch more hoops to jump through.
(Security issues, where you can put the files, who has access to them, group
policies, etc.)

Using shared add-ins really is not the way to go but if you want you can
have a read here to get started.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/840585/en-us



Austin Myers
MS PowerPoint MVP Team

Provider of PFCPro, PFCMedia and PFCExpress
www.playsforcertain.com