MySQL Bugs: #32502: Obscure error when attempting to start with no .NET installed

Bug #32502	Obscure error when attempting to start with no .NET installed
Submitted:	19 Nov 2007 20:30	Modified:	28 Mar 2008 17:19
Reporter:	John Yodsnukis (Basic Quality Contributor)	Email Updates:
Status:	Closed	Impact on me:	None
Category:	MySQL Workbench	Severity:	S3 (Non-critical)
Version:	5.0.10	OS:	Windows (XP Home SP2)
Assigned to:	Mike Lischke	CPU Architecture:	Any
Tags:	qc

Description:
When attempting to execute MySQLWorkbench.exe on a PC without .NET framework installed, the following error message is given:

The application failed to initialize properly (0xc0000135).

How to repeat:
Download mysql-workbench-oss-5.0.9-beta-win32-noinstall.zip to a PC that does not have .NET 2.0 installed.  Unzip and execute "MySQLWorkbench.exe"

Suggested fix:
Provide a more meaningful error message, for example ".NET 2.0 Framework is not installed."  To correct the initialization problem, install .NET 2.0 or greater from Windows Update.

Thank you for a problem report. Please, try to repeat with a newer version, 5.0.10, and inform about the results.

Verified as described with workbench 5.0.10.

Translation: the software couldn't be initialised. Please, click "OK" to exit the software.

Attachment: bug32502.jpg (image/jpeg, text), 13.16 KiB.

Yes, behavior is the same.  Note, that this is a pain to test.  It takes about 20 minutes to uninstall and reinstall .NET, so please verify that development has attempted to change this before asking to test it with a new release.

This behavior cannot be solved if no installer is used as the application cannot check the existence of the .NET installation since it won't run at all. There must be a clear indication in the docs that at least .NET 2.0 is required to run WB. If people ignore this requirement then they have to live with the error.

The msi installer however checks the .NET installation and gives useful feedback, so most people won't have that problem described here.

I'm not asking to change the behavior.  I'm asking for a more descriptive error message that explains what's causing the error.  i.e.  .NET is not installed.

The error is generated by the operating system, not by the application. An application cannot generate an error saying it could not be initialized (because by very definition, if the application didn't start, it cannot generate an error message because it isn't running). 

Therefore we cannot change the error message because this error message is owned by the operating system, not the application. 

There is already a note in the documentation that the .NET framework is required to run Workbench (http://dev.mysql.com/doc/workbench/en/wb-installing.html).

Thanks for explaining that it is a vague Windows error message and not a vague WB error message.  That wasn't clear to me before.  At least it is documented here in the bug system what is a possible cause of that error message.