Installing visual basic 6.0/32-bit applications in Windows 7

[Paul-NYS]

Hi

I am not a overly technical person, but am looking for some information on how to install a 32-bit VB 6.0/Access application on a Windows 7 PC. The application is an executable that accesses an Access DB through ODBC. We have a standard install package (setup.exe) that was created probably 5 years ago that installs system files needed to support the application.

I know there is a WOW environment in Windows 7 on which 32-bit applications can run and that these applications are supposed to run correctly in a 64-bit environment. However, I also know someone in our organization tried to install our 32-bit appl. and nothing happened.

Are there general resources for installing 32-bit appls. in Windows 7 available?

Paul

[baja_yu]

I never had a problem with installing an applicaiton on W7 or Vista.

How is your installer created? Did you try right click > Run as administrator? (but Windows should auto elevate it if it contains words like update, install, setup in the file name)

[Hack]

Moved To Applications Deployment

[dilettante]

ODBC is really the long way around to get to a Jet MDB. Either using DAO or ADO and the Jet OLEDB Provider are more common. One snag with ODBC is the tendency to use DSNs, which often live in the Registry. Using ADO you have the option of "DSN-less" connections or UDL files (How To Use Data Link Files with ADO).

But that may not be part of your problem depending on whether the ancient ODBC driver is present in Windows 7. It may only be installed if MS Access is installed, where ADO and the Jet OLEDB Provider are part of Windows now.


If you haven't been keeping up Vista introduced some changes to harden the system against several classes of exploits. Part of this is the protection of different parts of the filesystem and registry, along with filesystem and registry virtualization for old programs. These can lead to several troubling issues for programs that haven't been following the guidelines Microsoft put out a long time ago.

On 64-bit Windows there are other issues, such as registry and filesystem redirection. This causes a 32-bit process to see different locations than actually specified in the program. For example %WinDir%\System32 normally gets redirected to %WinDir%\SysWOW64 where 32-bit libraries and such live.

You can also run into some display issues due to High-DPI settings that Win7 will default to if you have a high resolution monitor.

Some problems can be worked around if you manually adjust application compatibility settings after installing your program. Many of these are exposed in the Properties of an EXE (navigate to the EXE in Windows Explorer, right-click, choose Properties...).


There is a FAQ post here for many of these issues. You won't find any general guidelines from Microsoft though becuse of the support status of VB6 (i.e. VB6 is no longer supported at a level offering any new developer information).