outlook 2007 and Winzip email companion

[b3Zlcmx5IGZydXN0cmF0ZWQ]

having a major issue with Outlook 2007 and Winzip email companion.

We have loaded the Winzip email companion on 40 test machines and are having

problems with approximately 8 of them.

The error is inconsistent. Sometimes it will work for a user and when you

exit and come back into Outlook, it will stop crash Outlook.

Outlook says there is a problem with the Winzip email companion add-in.

When the add-in is disabled, Outlook works fine.

We have contacted Winzip support and they say the problem is with Outlook.

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

 

[b3Zlcmx5IGZydXN0cmF0ZWQ]

UPDATE

The error messages I get when trying to send an email is:

Microsoft Office Outlook has encountered a problem and needs to close. We

are sorry for the inconvenience.

Microsoft Office Outlook

Outlook esperienced a serious problem with the 'winzip e-mail companion'

add-in. if you have seen this message multiple times, you should disable

this add-in and check to see if an update is available. Do you want to

disable this add-in?

In the event viewer it says:

Faulting application outlook.exe, version 12.0.6423.1000, stamp 49b08185

faulting module msvbvm60.dll, version 6.0.98.2, stamp 4802a186, debug? 0,

fault address 0x00105cf3.

Accepted safte Mode action: Microsoft Office Outlook.

"overly frustrated" wrote:


> having a major issue with Outlook 2007 and Winzip email companion.
> We have loaded the Winzip email companion on 40 test machines and are having
> problems with approximately 8 of them.
> The error is inconsistent. Sometimes it will work for a user and when you
> exit and come back into Outlook, it will stop crash Outlook.
> Outlook says there is a problem with the Winzip email companion add-in.
> When the add-in is disabled, Outlook works fine.
> We have contacted Winzip support and they say the problem is with Outlook.
> Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

>

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

What other addins are you running with Outlook on those problem machines?

That error message usually comes up with Companion when you are running an

addin that accesses the Outlook object model from a background thread. That

crashes or hangs Outlook and when Watson goes looking for a culprit it finds

an addin written using VB6, due to how the stack is set up in that case. It

doesn't mean the problem is actually caused by the addin that's implicated

by Watson. Companion was written using VB6.

I'm surprised that the WinZip support people told you the problem is with

Outlook, they are familiar with the problems caused by such badly written

addins and have dealt with those problems previously. You might want to try

escalating the problem with them and see what happens.

In any case, if my diagnosis is correct, the only way to get rid of the

problem and to continue using Companion (or indeed any addin written using

VB6) is to stop using the badly written addin or to find a later version

that doesn't access the Outlook object model from a background thread.

Some addins I've seen that do that are versions of the Apple ITunes Calendar

Synch, Blackberry, Plaxo, LinkedIn, Skype, and Google addins for Outlook.

That's by no means a comprehensive list.

Just so you know, I wrote the Companion addins for WinZip, so I'm quite

familiar with this problem and that error log entry.

"overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in

message news:A3B47EDC-B714-4055-A337-577AE87FD66A@microsoft.com...
> UPDATE
> The error messages I get when trying to send an email is:
> Microsoft Office Outlook has encountered a problem and needs to close. We
> are sorry for the inconvenience.

> Microsoft Office Outlook
> Outlook esperienced a serious problem with the 'winzip e-mail companion'
> add-in. if you have seen this message multiple times, you should disable
> this add-in and check to see if an update is available. Do you want to
> disable this add-in?

> In the event viewer it says:
> Faulting application outlook.exe, version 12.0.6423.1000, stamp 49b08185
> faulting module msvbvm60.dll, version 6.0.98.2, stamp 4802a186, debug? 0,
> fault address 0x00105cf3.

> Accepted safte Mode action: Microsoft Office Outlook.

> "overly frustrated" wrote:
>
> > having a major issue with Outlook 2007 and Winzip email companion.
> > We have loaded the Winzip email companion on 40 test machines and are
> > having
> > problems with approximately 8 of them.
> > The error is inconsistent. Sometimes it will work for a user and when
> > you
> > exit and come back into Outlook, it will stop crash Outlook.
> > Outlook says there is a problem with the Winzip email companion add-in.
> > When the add-in is disabled, Outlook works fine.
> > We have contacted Winzip support and they say the problem is with
> > Outlook.
> > Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
>

>>

 

[b3Zlcmx5IGZydXN0cmF0ZWQ]

Thanks for your reply Ken. I have read many articles and support you have

given throughout the years and was hoping that you would see my plea for help.

This is the reply I got from Winzip Technical Support:

This may be something that WinZip E-Mail Companion cannot control. We have

contacted Microsoft's Outlook team and reported problems that we have seen

with various Outlook add-ins. They are aware of the problems and it seems

that in most cases it is a result of the way that add-ins connect to Outlook.

The results of the investigation by Microsoft cleared Companion of any

faults, but did not present a pretty picture since there is no possible

change to the Companion that WinZip can make to prevent the problem from

occurring. There's also no way to prevent Companion from possibly being

blamed for the crashes. It appears, from our testing, that the blame goes

either to the last add-in installed or the last add-in on the list of add-ins.

To answer your question about add-ins:

Active Application Add-ins

Microsoft Exchange Unified Messaging

Microsoft Office SharePoint Servier Colleague Import Add-in

Microsoft Outlook Mobile Service

PDFMOutlook

WinZip E-Mail Companion

Inactive Appliation add-ins

Microsoft VBA for Outlook Addin

FYI - We are trying to use WinZip E-Mail Companion 2.0 so I don't believe

there is a higher version we can use.

And after reading WinZip's email again, I must admit that they are not

actually pointing the finger at Outlook as being the cause of my problems,

but they do say that Companion is cleared of any faults and it is the way

that add-ins connect to Outlook.
wrote:


> What other addins are you running with Outlook on those problem machines?

> That error message usually comes up with Companion when you are running an
> addin that accesses the Outlook object model from a background thread. That
> crashes or hangs Outlook and when Watson goes looking for a culprit it finds
> an addin written using VB6, due to how the stack is set up in that case. It
> doesn't mean the problem is actually caused by the addin that's implicated
> by Watson. Companion was written using VB6.

> I'm surprised that the WinZip support people told you the problem is with
> Outlook, they are familiar with the problems caused by such badly written
> addins and have dealt with those problems previously. You might want to try
> escalating the problem with them and see what happens.

> In any case, if my diagnosis is correct, the only way to get rid of the
> problem and to continue using Companion (or indeed any addin written using
> VB6) is to stop using the badly written addin or to find a later version
> that doesn't access the Outlook object model from a background thread.

> Some addins I've seen that do that are versions of the Apple ITunes Calendar
> Synch, Blackberry, Plaxo, LinkedIn, Skype, and Google addins for Outlook.
> That's by no means a comprehensive list.

> Just so you know, I wrote the Companion addins for WinZip, so I'm quite
> familiar with this problem and that error log entry.

> >

>

> "overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in
> message news:A3B47EDC-B714-4055-A337-577AE87FD66A@microsoft.com...
> > UPDATE
> > The error messages I get when trying to send an email is:
> > Microsoft Office Outlook has encountered a problem and needs to close. We
> > are sorry for the inconvenience.
> > Microsoft Office Outlook
> > Outlook esperienced a serious problem with the 'winzip e-mail companion'
> > add-in. if you have seen this message multiple times, you should disable
> > this add-in and check to see if an update is available. Do you want to
> > disable this add-in?
> > In the event viewer it says:
> > Faulting application outlook.exe, version 12.0.6423.1000, stamp 49b08185
> > faulting module msvbvm60.dll, version 6.0.98.2, stamp 4802a186, debug? 0,
> > fault address 0x00105cf3.
> > Accepted safte Mode action: Microsoft Office Outlook.
> > "overly frustrated" wrote:
> >
> >> having a major issue with Outlook 2007 and Winzip email companion.
> >> We have loaded the Winzip email companion on 40 test machines and are
> >> having
> >> problems with approximately 8 of them.
> >> The error is inconsistent. Sometimes it will work for a user and when
> >> you
> >> exit and come back into Outlook, it will stop crash Outlook.
> >> Outlook says there is a problem with the Winzip email companion add-in.
> >> When the add-in is disabled, Outlook works fine.
> >> We have contacted Winzip support and they say the problem is with
> >> Outlook.
> >> Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
> >
> >>

>

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

It's not really how any addins connect with Outlook, there's only one way to

do that. It's that some addins insist on accessing the Outlook object model

from a background thread. That's the problem, despite many years and KB

articles from MS saying not to do that.

I first discovered the problem in relation to the ITunes Calendar Synch

addin, which after synching would hang or crash Outlook and get Companion

blamed. In working with the top MAPI escalation engineer at MS we discovered

that Apple was doing that and that due to how the VB6 runtime is, that if

any VB6 addin is running when that background access occurs the top VB6

addin on the call stack gets the call and crashes the VB6 runtime, therefore

getting the VB6 addin blamed for the mess caused by some other code.

Even with Apple, where I worked with the dev for a couple of months to fix

all of their problems, they've backslid in some later versions and done the

same thing again.

MS usually doesn't do that sort of thing with the code they supply, but it's

hard to be positive. My initial guess would be the PDFMOutlook addin, which

in various incarnations has been know to do bad things to Outlook. However,

a systematic approach is best when troubleshooting.

What I'd do is to disable completely all the addins running, including

Companion. Repeat the steps needed to get the crash and make sure no crash

is happening with no addins. Then re-enable Companion. Test again. Repeat

until you start having problems again, then you disable that last addin and

verify the problems have stopped. That should isolate the culprit.

I've seen many addins doing this, so the next one you load may have the same

problems. You just never know.

When I was initially investigating this I contacted some friends who also

have VB6 addins out there, such as the owner of SperrySoftware and their

addins all also had the same problems when a miscreant addin was running, so

you just happened to run into the problem with Companion, it could very well

have been some other addin you were using that got the blame if it was

written using VB6.

Version 2.0 of Companion is the latest version, and support was correct that

there's nothing WinZip can do to prevent or workaround the problem, since

the crash is occurring in the VB6 runtime outside of Companion's executing

code or error handling. About the only thing that could be done would be to

completely rewrite the addin using C++ or managed code. And then the crash

or hang would still occur, it just wouldn't get blamed on that addin but

some other one.

"overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in

message news:E356ECFE-2EDA-44FE-BC71-6C600B50E7AB@microsoft.com...
> Thanks for your reply Ken. I have read many articles and support you have
> given throughout the years and was hoping that you would see my plea for
> help.
> This is the reply I got from Winzip Technical Support:

> This may be something that WinZip E-Mail Companion cannot control. We
> have
> contacted Microsoft's Outlook team and reported problems that we have seen
> with various Outlook add-ins. They are aware of the problems and it seems
> that in most cases it is a result of the way that add-ins connect to
> Outlook.

> The results of the investigation by Microsoft cleared Companion of any
> faults, but did not present a pretty picture since there is no possible
> change to the Companion that WinZip can make to prevent the problem from
> occurring. There's also no way to prevent Companion from possibly being
> blamed for the crashes. It appears, from our testing, that the blame goes
> either to the last add-in installed or the last add-in on the list of
> add-ins.

> To answer your question about add-ins:
> Active Application Add-ins
> Microsoft Exchange Unified Messaging
> Microsoft Office SharePoint Servier Colleague Import Add-in
> Microsoft Outlook Mobile Service
> PDFMOutlook
> WinZip E-Mail Companion
> Inactive Appliation add-ins
> Microsoft VBA for Outlook Addin

> FYI - We are trying to use WinZip E-Mail Companion 2.0 so I don't believe
> there is a higher version we can use.

> And after reading WinZip's email again, I must admit that they are not
> actually pointing the finger at Outlook as being the cause of my problems,
> but they do say that Companion is cleared of any faults and it is the way
> that add-ins connect to Outlook.

 

[b3Zlcmx5IGZydXN0cmF0ZWQ]

Thanks for sticking with me on this one Ken.

Unfortunately I have tried your troubleshooting. I have disabled every

add-in in Outlook and it seems to be stable. When I only activate the WinZip

E-mail Companion, Outlook still seems stable. When I exit out of Outlook and

go back it in, Outlook will crash as soon as I try to send an email. I check

under Trust Center and no other add-ins were active except for WinZip E-mail

Companion.

We have removed Adobe Acrobat 8 completely off of a couple machines and

Outlook still crashes. I'm assuming this would also remove the PDFMOutlook

add-in.

So what I'm understanding from your last reply, our only course of action is

to rewrite the addin using C++.

Our company has paid for a few thousand licenses of this add-in. WinZip has

opened the door for us if we want a refund, but we don't really want to take

this avenue:

If you have purchased E-Mail Companion and this issue would casue you to

want a refund, that can certainly be arranged. If you have been evaluating

the Companion you may want to consider using something else to meet your

needs.

Any thoughts or opinions from you would be greatly appreciated Ken.
wrote:


> It's not really how any addins connect with Outlook, there's only one way to
> do that. It's that some addins insist on accessing the Outlook object model
> from a background thread. That's the problem, despite many years and KB
> articles from MS saying not to do that.

> I first discovered the problem in relation to the ITunes Calendar Synch
> addin, which after synching would hang or crash Outlook and get Companion
> blamed. In working with the top MAPI escalation engineer at MS we discovered
> that Apple was doing that and that due to how the VB6 runtime is, that if
> any VB6 addin is running when that background access occurs the top VB6
> addin on the call stack gets the call and crashes the VB6 runtime, therefore
> getting the VB6 addin blamed for the mess caused by some other code.

> Even with Apple, where I worked with the dev for a couple of months to fix
> all of their problems, they've backslid in some later versions and done the
> same thing again.

> MS usually doesn't do that sort of thing with the code they supply, but it's
> hard to be positive. My initial guess would be the PDFMOutlook addin, which
> in various incarnations has been know to do bad things to Outlook. However,
> a systematic approach is best when troubleshooting.

> What I'd do is to disable completely all the addins running, including
> Companion. Repeat the steps needed to get the crash and make sure no crash
> is happening with no addins. Then re-enable Companion. Test again. Repeat
> until you start having problems again, then you disable that last addin and
> verify the problems have stopped. That should isolate the culprit.

> I've seen many addins doing this, so the next one you load may have the same
> problems. You just never know.

> When I was initially investigating this I contacted some friends who also
> have VB6 addins out there, such as the owner of SperrySoftware and their
> addins all also had the same problems when a miscreant addin was running, so
> you just happened to run into the problem with Companion, it could very well
> have been some other addin you were using that got the blame if it was
> written using VB6.

> Version 2.0 of Companion is the latest version, and support was correct that
> there's nothing WinZip can do to prevent or workaround the problem, since
> the crash is occurring in the VB6 runtime outside of Companion's executing
> code or error handling. About the only thing that could be done would be to
> completely rewrite the addin using C++ or managed code. And then the crash
> or hang would still occur, it just wouldn't get blamed on that addin but
> some other one.

> >

>

> "overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in
> message news:E356ECFE-2EDA-44FE-BC71-6C600B50E7AB@microsoft.com...
> > Thanks for your reply Ken. I have read many articles and support you have
> > given throughout the years and was hoping that you would see my plea for
> > help.
> > This is the reply I got from Winzip Technical Support:
> > This may be something that WinZip E-Mail Companion cannot control. We
> > have
> > contacted Microsoft's Outlook team and reported problems that we have seen
> > with various Outlook add-ins. They are aware of the problems and it seems
> > that in most cases it is a result of the way that add-ins connect to
> > Outlook.
> > The results of the investigation by Microsoft cleared Companion of any
> > faults, but did not present a pretty picture since there is no possible
> > change to the Companion that WinZip can make to prevent the problem from
> > occurring. There's also no way to prevent Companion from possibly being
> > blamed for the crashes. It appears, from our testing, that the blame goes
> > either to the last add-in installed or the last add-in on the list of
> > add-ins.
> > To answer your question about add-ins:
> > Active Application Add-ins
> > Microsoft Exchange Unified Messaging
> > Microsoft Office SharePoint Servier Colleague Import Add-in
> > Microsoft Outlook Mobile Service
> > PDFMOutlook
> > WinZip E-Mail Companion
> > Inactive Appliation add-ins
> > Microsoft VBA for Outlook Addin
> > FYI - We are trying to use WinZip E-Mail Companion 2.0 so I don't believe
> > there is a higher version we can use.
> > And after reading WinZip's email again, I must admit that they are not
> > actually pointing the finger at Outlook as being the cause of my problems,
> > but they do say that Companion is cleared of any faults and it is the way
> > that add-ins connect to Outlook.

>

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

So with only Companion running as an addin Outlook crashes when you send an

email? Does it crash also if you set Companion to not zip your attachments

(don't zip automatically in the Send Options tab of the Companion settings

dialog)? Using it that way eliminates Companion from the sending equation.

Are there any error log entries in the Companion error logs?

It would be a huge undertaking to rewrite Companion in C++, even if you

could get hold of the source code from WinZip. I wouldn't do it, I prefer

not to code in C++.

What I'd probably do is open a support case with MS on this, they can read

the crash logs whereas that's very hard for anyone else to do especially

since they won't release the Outlook symbols. I'd get a crash dump and have

them evaluate it and see where the crash is happening and why.

It can be all sorts of weird things. For example, some software, I forget

exactly what, was or is being installed by Dell. It replaced Kernel32.dll

with one that had hooks into its own code. If that code was disabled or

uninstalled and kernel32 wasn't restored then it caused a crash in the VB6

runtime when the runtime called into one specific kernel32 method.

Everything else worked OK in kernel32 but that one call. MS found that one

for me (it also turned up as a crash of Companion), but any dev should know

not to replace kernel32, it's just a horrible thing to do.

You said you purchased thousands of Companion licenses, do you see the same

problem on all user machines or only some? The only other thing would be if

only some have the problem and then finding out where they differ from users

who don't have the problem.

I run Companion here on all my 7 Office 2007 setups with no problems, and

some of those machines are very heavily loaded with various addins, so I

know this isn't a universal problem.

"overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in

message news:F4CD90A8-D137-477C-B3A5-AEC5E1EBA6FE@microsoft.com...
> Thanks for sticking with me on this one Ken.

> Unfortunately I have tried your troubleshooting. I have disabled every
> add-in in Outlook and it seems to be stable. When I only activate the
> WinZip
> E-mail Companion, Outlook still seems stable. When I exit out of Outlook
> and
> go back it in, Outlook will crash as soon as I try to send an email. I
> check
> under Trust Center and no other add-ins were active except for WinZip
> E-mail
> Companion.
> We have removed Adobe Acrobat 8 completely off of a couple machines and
> Outlook still crashes. I'm assuming this would also remove the
> PDFMOutlook
> add-in.
> So what I'm understanding from your last reply, our only course of action
> is
> to rewrite the addin using C++.
> Our company has paid for a few thousand licenses of this add-in. WinZip
> has
> opened the door for us if we want a refund, but we don't really want to
> take
> this avenue:

> If you have purchased E-Mail Companion and this issue would casue you to
> want a refund, that can certainly be arranged. If you have been evaluating
> the Companion you may want to consider using something else to meet your
> needs.

> Any thoughts or opinions from you would be greatly appreciated Ken.

> " - " wrote:
>
> > It's not really how any addins connect with Outlook, there's only one way
> > to
> > do that. It's that some addins insist on accessing the Outlook object
> > model
> > from a background thread. That's the problem, despite many years and KB
> > articles from MS saying not to do that.
>

>> I first discovered the problem in relation to the ITunes Calendar Synch
> > addin, which after synching would hang or crash Outlook and get Companion
> > blamed. In working with the top MAPI escalation engineer at MS we
> > discovered
> > that Apple was doing that and that due to how the VB6 runtime is, that if
> > any VB6 addin is running when that background access occurs the top VB6
> > addin on the call stack gets the call and crashes the VB6 runtime,
> > therefore
> > getting the VB6 addin blamed for the mess caused by some other code.
>

>> Even with Apple, where I worked with the dev for a couple of months to
> > fix
> > all of their problems, they've backslid in some later versions and done
> > the
> > same thing again.
>

>> MS usually doesn't do that sort of thing with the code they supply, but
> > it's
> > hard to be positive. My initial guess would be the PDFMOutlook addin,
> > which
> > in various incarnations has been know to do bad things to Outlook.
> > However,
> > a systematic approach is best when troubleshooting.
>

>> What I'd do is to disable completely all the addins running, including
> > Companion. Repeat the steps needed to get the crash and make sure no
> > crash
> > is happening with no addins. Then re-enable Companion. Test again. Repeat
> > until you start having problems again, then you disable that last addin
> > and
> > verify the problems have stopped. That should isolate the culprit.
>

>> I've seen many addins doing this, so the next one you load may have the
> > same
> > problems. You just never know.
>

>> When I was initially investigating this I contacted some friends who also
> > have VB6 addins out there, such as the owner of SperrySoftware and their
> > addins all also had the same problems when a miscreant addin was running,
> > so
> > you just happened to run into the problem with Companion, it could very
> > well
> > have been some other addin you were using that got the blame if it was
> > written using VB6.
>

>> Version 2.0 of Companion is the latest version, and support was correct
> > that
> > there's nothing WinZip can do to prevent or workaround the problem, since
> > the crash is occurring in the VB6 runtime outside of Companion's
> > executing
> > code or error handling. About the only thing that could be done would be
> > to
> > completely rewrite the addin using C++ or managed code. And then the
> > crash
> > or hang would still occur, it just wouldn't get blamed on that addin but
> > some other one.
>

>> > >

> >

>

>
>
>
>
>
>> "overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in
> > message news:E356ECFE-2EDA-44FE-BC71-6C600B50E7AB@microsoft.com...
> > > Thanks for your reply Ken. I have read many articles and support you
> > > have
> > > given throughout the years and was hoping that you would see my plea
> > > for
> > > help.
> > > This is the reply I got from Winzip Technical Support:
> >> > This may be something that WinZip E-Mail Companion cannot control. We
> > > have
> > > contacted Microsoft's Outlook team and reported problems that we have
> > > seen
> > > with various Outlook add-ins. They are aware of the problems and it
> > > seems
> > > that in most cases it is a result of the way that add-ins connect to
> > > Outlook.
> >> > The results of the investigation by Microsoft cleared Companion of any
> > > faults, but did not present a pretty picture since there is no possible
> > > change to the Companion that WinZip can make to prevent the problem
> > > from
> > > occurring. There's also no way to prevent Companion from possibly
> > > being
> > > blamed for the crashes. It appears, from our testing, that the blame
> > > goes
> > > either to the last add-in installed or the last add-in on the list of
> > > add-ins.
> >> > To answer your question about add-ins:
> > > Active Application Add-ins
> > > Microsoft Exchange Unified Messaging
> > > Microsoft Office SharePoint Servier Colleague Import Add-in
> > > Microsoft Outlook Mobile Service
> > > PDFMOutlook
> > > WinZip E-Mail Companion
> > > Inactive Appliation add-ins
> > > Microsoft VBA for Outlook Addin
> >> > FYI - We are trying to use WinZip E-Mail Companion 2.0 so I don't
> > > believe
> > > there is a higher version we can use.
> >> > And after reading WinZip's email again, I must admit that they are not
> > > actually pointing the finger at Outlook as being the cause of my
> > > problems,
> > > but they do say that Companion is cleared of any faults and it is the
> > > way
> > > that add-ins connect to Outlook.
>

>>

 

[b3Zlcmx5IGZydXN0cmF0ZWQ]

Yes, it crashes when you send an email. It also crashes when you do not zip

your attachments. It also crashes if you don't send the email, just opening

the new mail

message window and then closing it. When you go back into Outlook it asks

weather you want to disable the WinZip add-in.

Sorry Ken, I do not know where to look for the Companion error logs. Can

you tell me the path where to look?
wrote:


> So with only Companion running as an addin Outlook crashes when you send an
> email? Does it crash also if you set Companion to not zip your attachments
> (don't zip automatically in the Send Options tab of the Companion settings
> dialog)? Using it that way eliminates Companion from the sending equation.

> Are there any error log entries in the Companion error logs?

> It would be a huge undertaking to rewrite Companion in C++, even if you
> could get hold of the source code from WinZip. I wouldn't do it, I prefer
> not to code in C++.

> What I'd probably do is open a support case with MS on this, they can read
> the crash logs whereas that's very hard for anyone else to do especially
> since they won't release the Outlook symbols. I'd get a crash dump and have
> them evaluate it and see where the crash is happening and why.

> It can be all sorts of weird things. For example, some software, I forget
> exactly what, was or is being installed by Dell. It replaced Kernel32.dll
> with one that had hooks into its own code. If that code was disabled or
> uninstalled and kernel32 wasn't restored then it caused a crash in the VB6
> runtime when the runtime called into one specific kernel32 method.
> Everything else worked OK in kernel32 but that one call. MS found that one
> for me (it also turned up as a crash of Companion), but any dev should know
> not to replace kernel32, it's just a horrible thing to do.

> You said you purchased thousands of Companion licenses, do you see the same
> problem on all user machines or only some? The only other thing would be if
> only some have the problem and then finding out where they differ from users
> who don't have the problem.

> I run Companion here on all my 7 Office 2007 setups with no problems, and
> some of those machines are very heavily loaded with various addins, so I
> know this isn't a universal problem.

> >

>

> "overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in
> message news:F4CD90A8-D137-477C-B3A5-AEC5E1EBA6FE@microsoft.com...
> > Thanks for sticking with me on this one Ken.
> > Unfortunately I have tried your troubleshooting. I have disabled every
> > add-in in Outlook and it seems to be stable. When I only activate the
> > WinZip
> > E-mail Companion, Outlook still seems stable. When I exit out of Outlook
> > and
> > go back it in, Outlook will crash as soon as I try to send an email. I
> > check
> > under Trust Center and no other add-ins were active except for WinZip
> > E-mail
> > Companion.
> > We have removed Adobe Acrobat 8 completely off of a couple machines and
> > Outlook still crashes. I'm assuming this would also remove the
> > PDFMOutlook
> > add-in.
> > So what I'm understanding from your last reply, our only course of action
> > is
> > to rewrite the addin using C++.
> > Our company has paid for a few thousand licenses of this add-in. WinZip
> > has
> > opened the door for us if we want a refund, but we don't really want to
> > take
> > this avenue:
> > If you have purchased E-Mail Companion and this issue would casue you to
> > want a refund, that can certainly be arranged. If you have been evaluating
> > the Companion you may want to consider using something else to meet your
> > needs.
> > Any thoughts or opinions from you would be greatly appreciated Ken.
> > " - " wrote:
> >
> >> It's not really how any addins connect with Outlook, there's only one way
> >> to
> >> do that. It's that some addins insist on accessing the Outlook object
> >> model
> >> from a background thread. That's the problem, despite many years and KB
> >> articles from MS saying not to do that.
> >
> >> I first discovered the problem in relation to the ITunes Calendar Synch
> >> addin, which after synching would hang or crash Outlook and get Companion
> >> blamed. In working with the top MAPI escalation engineer at MS we
> >> discovered
> >> that Apple was doing that and that due to how the VB6 runtime is, that if
> >> any VB6 addin is running when that background access occurs the top VB6
> >> addin on the call stack gets the call and crashes the VB6 runtime,
> >> therefore
> >> getting the VB6 addin blamed for the mess caused by some other code.
> >
> >> Even with Apple, where I worked with the dev for a couple of months to
> >> fix
> >> all of their problems, they've backslid in some later versions and done
> >> the
> >> same thing again.
> >
> >> MS usually doesn't do that sort of thing with the code they supply, but
> >> it's
> >> hard to be positive. My initial guess would be the PDFMOutlook addin,
> >> which
> >> in various incarnations has been know to do bad things to Outlook.
> >> However,
> >> a systematic approach is best when troubleshooting.
> >
> >> What I'd do is to disable completely all the addins running, including
> >> Companion. Repeat the steps needed to get the crash and make sure no
> >> crash
> >> is happening with no addins. Then re-enable Companion. Test again. Repeat
> >> until you start having problems again, then you disable that last addin
> >> and
> >> verify the problems have stopped. That should isolate the culprit.
> >
> >> I've seen many addins doing this, so the next one you load may have the
> >> same
> >> problems. You just never know.
> >
> >> When I was initially investigating this I contacted some friends who also
> >> have VB6 addins out there, such as the owner of SperrySoftware and their
> >> addins all also had the same problems when a miscreant addin was running,
> >> so
> >> you just happened to run into the problem with Companion, it could very
> >> well
> >> have been some other addin you were using that got the blame if it was
> >> written using VB6.
> >
> >> Version 2.0 of Companion is the latest version, and support was correct
> >> that
> >> there's nothing WinZip can do to prevent or workaround the problem, since
> >> the crash is occurring in the VB6 runtime outside of Companion's
> >> executing
> >> code or error handling. About the only thing that could be done would be
> >> to
> >> completely rewrite the addin using C++ or managed code. And then the
> >> crash
> >> or hang would still occur, it just wouldn't get blamed on that addin but
> >> some other one.
> >
> >> > >>

> >>

> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >> "overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in
> >> message news:E356ECFE-2EDA-44FE-BC71-6C600B50E7AB@microsoft.com...
> >> > Thanks for your reply Ken. I have read many articles and support you
> >> > have
> >> > given throughout the years and was hoping that you would see my plea
> >> > for
> >> > help.
> >> > This is the reply I got from Winzip Technical Support:
> >> >> > This may be something that WinZip E-Mail Companion cannot control. We
> >> > have
> >> > contacted Microsoft's Outlook team and reported problems that we have
> >> > seen
> >> > with various Outlook add-ins. They are aware of the problems and it
> >> > seems
> >> > that in most cases it is a result of the way that add-ins connect to
> >> > Outlook.
> >> >> > The results of the investigation by Microsoft cleared Companion of any
> >> > faults, but did not present a pretty picture since there is no possible
> >> > change to the Companion that WinZip can make to prevent the problem
> >> > from
> >> > occurring. There's also no way to prevent Companion from possibly
> >> > being
> >> > blamed for the crashes. It appears, from our testing, that the blame
> >> > goes
> >> > either to the last add-in installed or the last add-in on the list of
> >> > add-ins.
> >> >> > To answer your question about add-ins:
> >> > Active Application Add-ins
> >> > Microsoft Exchange Unified Messaging
> >> > Microsoft Office SharePoint Servier Colleague Import Add-in
> >> > Microsoft Outlook Mobile Service
> >> > PDFMOutlook
> >> > WinZip E-Mail Companion
> >> > Inactive Appliation add-ins
> >> > Microsoft VBA for Outlook Addin
> >> >> > FYI - We are trying to use WinZip E-Mail Companion 2.0 so I don't
> >> > believe
> >> > there is a higher version we can use.
> >> >> > And after reading WinZip's email again, I must admit that they are not
> >> > actually pointing the finger at Outlook as being the cause of my
> >> > problems,
> >> > but they do say that Companion is cleared of any faults and it is the
> >> > way
> >> > that add-ins connect to Outlook.
> >
> >>

>

 

[Ken Slovak - [MVP - Outlook]]

Just opening and closing an email window crashes Outlook? Wow.

Is this on all systems or only some? Is this Office 2007 gold, SP1 or SP2?

Windows version?

The error log would be under <localAppData>\WinZip Email Companion\.

I'd like to discuss this with my contacts at WinZip and see what's going on.

Ping me back at the email address I use here for posting with some

information I can use to identify your case with the WinZip support people

so I can take this up with them. I may burn an MS support case to try to

find out what's going on.

"overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in

message news:748CD9AF-64D2-4FCD-A0FF-5D1B36CF23D5@microsoft.com...
> Yes, it crashes when you send an email. It also crashes when you do not
> zip
> your attachments. It also crashes if you don't send the email, just
> opening
> the new mail
> message window and then closing it. When you go back into Outlook it asks
> weather you want to disable the WinZip add-in.
> Sorry Ken, I do not know where to look for the Companion error logs. Can
> you tell me the path where to look?

 

[b3Zlcmx5IGZydXN0cmF0ZWQ]

It is crashing on most desktops and laptops. We have one system that anyone

can log onto and WinZip works fine. Then we have another system that crashes

whenever someone logs on. We cannot narrow down what might be causing this.

On some machines an account will be working, as soon as we exit Outlook and

go back in, Outlook crashes with the WinZip add-in error.

We are running Microsoft Office 2003 with SP3 and Microsoft Outlook 2007

with SP2

OS is Windows XP with SP3. Sorry, don't know Office 2007 gold.

When I go to c:\Documents and Settings\<User>\Local Settings\Application

Data, there is a folder called WinZip E-mail Companion but it is empty on all

machines.
wrote:


> Just opening and closing an email window crashes Outlook? Wow.

> Is this on all systems or only some? Is this Office 2007 gold, SP1 or SP2?
> Windows version?

> The error log would be under <localAppData>\WinZip Email Companion\.

> I'd like to discuss this with my contacts at WinZip and see what's going on.
> Ping me back at the email address I use here for posting with some
> information I can use to identify your case with the WinZip support people
> so I can take this up with them. I may burn an MS support case to try to
> find out what's going on.

> >

>

> "overly frustrated" <overlyfrustrated> wrote in
> message news:748CD9AF-64D2-4FCD-A0FF-5D1B36CF23D5@microsoft.com...
> > Yes, it crashes when you send an email. It also crashes when you do not
> > zip
> > your attachments. It also crashes if you don't send the email, just
> > opening
> > the new mail
> > message window and then closing it. When you go back into Outlook it asks
> > weather you want to disable the WinZip add-in.
> > Sorry Ken, I do not know where to look for the Companion error logs. Can
> > you tell me the path where to look?

>