B2SBackglassServerRegisterApp will not register. Cannot create ActiveX component

[jarr3]

4 hours ago, Cliffy said:

I've always used 7zip but by habit I always unlock everything anyway. Heres a snapshot of the cmd line reg attempt you suggested. I attempted with your newest 2.0.1

I looks like it got registered but has a problem to activate the COM server.

 

please take a break, I will check what mistake I did in the code here...

[MikeDASpike]

4 hours ago, jarr3 said:

Which directory are you talking about? For B2S Server we have never had to do any 64bit registering!

Well, thats what your code does for registration does. It register the dll for 

.Net\framework\<version>\regasm and does the same for .Net\framework64\<version>\regasm.

Thats why I mention it

[jarr3]

3 hours ago, MikeDASpike said:

Well, thats what your code does for registration does. It register the dll for 

.Net\framework\<version>\regasm and does the same for .Net\framework64\<version>\regasm.

Thats why I mention it

I thought you where talking about getting the x64 bit version. 

 

Yes, you are right. currently we use B2S "x86" which is actually compiled as "AnyCPU" which works with both x86 and x64.

Not that this is my specialist area though. But so far it seems to work really good.

 

Now we just have to make your and Cliffy's installation going.

 

[jarr3]

@Cliffy  there is an interesting hint in the other forum from @MikeDASpike

[jarr3]

I have been comparing the 1.3.1 with 1.4.1 version, but there is nothing obvious, apart...

it is so long ago, it's when we moved to github and the VS compiler is a newer version.

 

So I assume it is something .net like Can you please update from official place: https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/download/dotnet-framework

[Cliffy]

Some good news and progress today, thanks to @jarr3, @MikeDASpike and @Tikimaster.

I created a new folder on my 😄 drive called B2S and unzipped all the newest b2sserver stuff there. I ran the register app (always as admin) and by God this time it worked!  (B2SBackglassServer-2.0.1-c95db4d-Release-win-x86)

For history/background I have two drives, ssd as 😄 for OS only (mostly) and hdd as d: drive where all vpinball resides and up until this problem had always, always worked just fine.  Also this is on the crashed windows 10 pc. I've yet to try this on the brand new win 11 pc. Trepidations ya know

This is the x86 version and again too scared to even try 64 bit yet. vpx 64 never had a problem in the past but simply will not start at all now. I hate to think moving it to 😄 but may do so just to see if that solves it's problem as well. Stay tuned

[Cliffy]

Finally solved for me! With some insanely deep dive testing to a level I wouldn't believe we could do, @jarr3 was able to finally discover exactly why I could not get the b2sregister app to work. No matter what I did, no matter how many times I installed runtimes and .net and system restores, to the point of buying a new pc even and still would always say not registered, cannot create activex component!!! What in God's name was wrong!? Sonofa....! Richard found out it was the simplest, stupidest thing one can imagine. A missing close arrow on the last line of my b2stablesettings.xml. My God. Really? Yes. Because of my own OCD behavior, where I simply *must* copy all games in the xml into alphabetical order with notepad++, at some point I cut that one character too many and killed the xml proper syntax.

</zof10
</B2STableSettings>  

See what I did up there? Yeah. The > is missing. Should always be like this;

</zof10>
</B2STableSettings>

Once I fixed the xml I can register the b2s server from any folder, anytime now. My Lord I am so relieved! Hopefully this will turn up in a search of the same problem and help others. @jarr3 will be adding to the b2s wiki and adding a popup error in the next versions. 

Finally I need to thank some incredibly tireless helpers who just would NOT give up on this. @MikeDASpike, @Tikimaster and most of all @jarr3 who gave up long evenings struggling to discover the "why". And thanks to all in these threads who offered suggestions as well! They all helped to determine what the problem was not, by elimination leading to what the problem was. I am excited to be back in the game - THANKS!!! 

[Tikimaster]

@Cliffy I am very happy that the f+++ing error was as small, as I aspected. 🙂 We changed and suspected every component of this problem, but no one of us came to the simple idea to delete the xml and use a fresh or another one.
stunning. Who would have thought that a simple error in the xml file has an impact on the installation. Unbelievable.
I am happy to see you back. Thanks to Richard and everybody involved.

Edited April 1, 2023 by Tikimaster

[Cliffy]

12 minutes ago, Tikimaster said:

@Cliffy I am very happy that the f+++ing error was as small, as I aspected. 🙂 We changed and suspected every component of this problem, but no one of us came to the simple idea to delete the xml and use a fresh or another one.
stunning. Who would have thought that a simple error in the xml file has an impact on the installation. Unbelievable.
I am happy to see you back. Thanks to Richard and everybody involved.

YEP! The register app needs the b2stablesettings.xml and it needs to be correctly formatted (duh). I had no idea or clue that the reg app was looking for the xml. Richard will be adding this as a warning error to the app soon. Progress!