OFF2000: Transform Provides More Descriptive Error Messages (230903)


The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft Office 2000 Premium
  • Microsoft Office 2000 Professoinal
  • Microsoft Office 2000 Standard
  • Microsoft Office 2000 Small Business
  • Microsoft Office 2000 Developer
  • Microsoft Access 2000
  • Microsoft Excel 2000
  • Microsoft FrontPage 2000
  • Microsoft Outlook 2000
  • Microsoft PowerPoint 2000
  • Microsoft Word 2000
This article was previously published under Q230903

SUMMARY

When you run Office Setup, you may encounter an error message that gives an error number followed by the following text:
Please contact product support for assistance.
All of the internal errors in Office Setup are designed to show this message. However, Microsoft Product Support Services has created the transform Errors.mst specifically to show more descriptive text along with the error number.

MORE INFORMATION

You can use Errors.mst with any Office 2000 product to generate more information about an error message you might receive during Office Setup. Based on this text, you may be more able to more quickly resolve your Setup issue.

Downloading the Transform

To download Errors.mst, do the following steps:
  1. Enter the following Web address in your Web browser:

    http://www.microsoft.com/office/ork/2000/appndx/toolbox.htm

  2. Scroll down the page and locate the link for Errors.mst.
  3. Right-click the link for Errors.mst.
  4. Click Save Target As in the shortcut menu.
  5. Select a download location in the Save As dialog box, and click Save.

Using the Transform

To use the transform Errors.mst, do the following steps:
  1. Move Errors.mst to the root of your drive C.
  2. On the Start menu, click Run.
  3. In the Open box, type the following command line and click OK:

    <path to Office source>\Setup.exe Transforms=C:\Errors.mst

    NOTE: <path to Office source> is the full path to the location from which you are running Office Setup. For example, this may be E: if your CD-ROM drive is drive E.
If you receive an internal error message during Setup, you should see text other than "Internal Error ####: Please contact product support for assistance". For example, if you specified more than 52 characters for the CompanyName property (in the Setup.ini file), the following descriptive error message appears:
Warning 2893. The control Company on dialog UserInfo can accept property values that are at most 52 characters long. The value <name longer than 52 characters> exceeds this limit, and has been truncated.

Using the Errors Transform with Another Transform

If you have your own transform created by the Custom Installation Wizard (CIW), you can still use it along with the Errors.mst transform. To do this, you can add both transforms on the command line, or you can modify the Setup.ini file.
  • Using the command line:

    If you want to use the command line to specify both transforms, use syntax similar to the following:

    <path>\Setup.exe Transforms=Mycustom.mst;Errors.mst

    NOTE: The list of transforms on the command line is a semicolon-delimited list with no spaces.

  • Modifying the Setup.ini file:

    If you do not want to use the command line to specify the transforms to use, you can modify the [MST] section of the Setup.ini file. To do this, do the following steps:
    1. Open the Setup.ini file in a text editor like WordPad.
    2. Remove the semicolon from the [MST] line.
    3. Add the following MST1 and MST2 lines to the [MST] section:

      MST1=<path>\Mycustom.mst
      MST2=<path>\Errors.mst

    4. If you saved your Setup.ini file to a location other than the root of the Office Setup files, or you used a different name for the Setup.ini file, then run Setup using the following command line:

      <path>\Setup.exe /Settings <path to Setup.ini>

For additional information about troubleshooting Office Setup problems using Setup log files, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

237957 OFF2000: How to Use a Log File to Troubleshoot Setup Problems

Modification Type:MinorLast Reviewed:10/13/2006
Keywords:kbinfo KB230903
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