MSI Logging, Merging and Formatting Multiple Logs

Generating an MSI log is essential for troubleshooting an MSI installation. The following tip can be very helpful in certain cases where you want to handle multiple installations and with a single output.

As we know the command lines used for generating log file is:

 
/log <LogFile> that is Equivalent of /l* <LogFile>

We can generate a verbose log using /l*v option.

With a verbose log file you can find out the reason for unexpected failures during any phase of your install and additional information about how Windows Installer processes your MSI to make changes to the system.

Combining Multiple Log files in one file we can merge multiple log file output by pointing to a single file using /l + v option.

Problem:

When we merge a non-MSI log file with an MSI log file, it loses the word format.

Example:

If we have a log file called Install.log which already had a value, say

File Copied (5)
Installation successful

If we try merging an msi log to the above file, it loses the format as:

File Copied (5)
Installation successful
= = = V e r b o s e l o g g i n g s t a r t e d : 3 / 2 7 / 2 0 0 8 1 0 : 1 0 : 5 8 B u i l d t y p e : S H I P U N I C O D E 3 . 0 1 . 4 0 0 0 . 2 4 3 5 C a l l i n g p r o c e s s : C : \ W I N D O W S \ S y s t e m 3 2 \ m s i e x e c . e x e = = =

Solution:

There are two possible solution to get a proper formatted log file.

Option 1: Merge the non MSI log file to the MSI log and not the vise versa.

Option 2: Use /l* only and not verbose logging option.