FIX: Help, Online Books Inaccessible After Custom Install (103712)
The information in this article applies to:
- Microsoft Visual C++ 1.0
- Microsoft Visual C++ 2.0
- Microsoft Visual C++ 2.1
- Microsoft Visual C++ 4.0
This article was previously published under Q103712 SYMPTOMS
After a CD-ROM install, a Custom install of only the Help files or Books
Online renders the online documentation unavailable. In Visual C++
versions 1.0 and 2.x, if the App Studio, Visual Workbench, Build Tools,
Technical Support, or Index option is selected from the Help menu, the
following error message will be displayed:
The file <helpfile> cannot be found.
The <helpfile> is one of the following:
MSVC.HLP
APSTUDIO.HLP
TOOLS32.HLP
MSVC32.IDX
PSSWH.HLP
In Visual C++ version 4.0, upon opening the Microsoft Developer Studio,
the following error message will be displayed:
Cannot open auxiliary information file. The title may be improperly
set up.
This error message also appears when the Contents and Search options are
selected from the Help menu.
CAUSE
When installing just the Help files or Online Books, Setup copies only
a subset of the online documentation files to the destination drive,
assuming that certain files have already been installed. Setup then sets
the help file search path to be that of only the current destination
drive and directory. This directory does not contain all the necessary
files.
STATUS
Microsoft has confirmed this to be a bug in the Microsoft products
listed at the beginning of this article. This bug was corrected in
Visual C++ version 4.1.
RESOLUTION
There are three ways to work around this problem: - Append the CD-ROM help path using Visual Workbench's Options
directory. Select Options, then choose Directories and append a
semicolon followed by the CD-ROM help directory to the Help Files
Path section.
NOTE: This workaround is not available with Visual C++
version 4.0 because there is no Help Files Path option in the
Directories Tab of the Options dialog box.
-or-
- For Visual C++ version 4.0, perform a Custom install of at least the
Microsoft Developer Studio and the Books Online. For Visual C++
versions 1.0 and 2.x, do a Custom install of Visual Workbench and App
Studio. This will install the help files to the hard drive.
-or-
- For Visual C++ version 4.0, copy all files from the \MSDEV\HELP
directory on the distribution CD to the %MsDevDir%\HELP directory.
(MsDevDir is an environment variable the points to the directory in
which Visual C++ version 4.0 is installed.) For Visual C++
versions 1.0 and 2.x, copy the Help files listed in the SYMPTOMS
section above from the CD to the HELP directory on the hard drive.
MORE INFORMATION
With a CD-ROM installation, no Help files are copied from the CD to the
destination drive. The help file search path correctly points to the
CD-ROM drive.
Setup does not check for a previous CD-ROM installation. So, when
performing an online documentation only installation, Setup does not
append the new help files search path to the existing one. Instead, it
merely sets this path to that of help files in the destination directory.
| Modification Type: | Major | Last Reviewed: | 12/2/2003 |
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| Keywords: | kbbug kbfix kbsetup KB103712 |
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