Two instances of VS2017 installed, NCrunch only install into one

I installed VS2017 Pro, then later got access to VS2017 Enterprise. Since there isn't an upgrade path between the two, the installer will install Enterprise into a different folder, thus allowing side-by-side installations of the two SKUs.

VS2017 Pro is installed into "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2017\Professional\Common7\IDE\devenv.exe"
VS2017 Ent is installed into "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2017\Enterprise\Common7\IDE\devenv.exe"

I uninstalled and reinstalled NCrunch VS2017 3.9.0.1, but it only is enabled in VS2017 Pro and is not available in VS2017 Enterprise.

Within Visual Studio Pro, if I go to Tools -> Extensions and Updates, NCrunch is listed under the "Installed" section.
Within Enterprise, NCrunch does not show in the Installed section. It is available in the "Online" (VS Marketplace) section, but at v3.8 only.

Is this an issue within NCrunch (maybe the installer), or with my system configuration maybe?

Hi,

This is a known problem and a limitation with the NCrunch installer. Building an MSI that can have multiple dynamically derived install paths is problematic. I haven't yet found an acceptable solution to this problem.

For now, it's best to just install the product manually if you have multiple versions of VS2017 installed side-by-side.

I had the same problem, only I had VS 2017 Community and VS 2017 Pro installed... So we're all programmers here, what are you using to build your msi... WiX or InstallShield or NSIS or some other setup -- maybe one of us can help! :)

My solution was just to uninstall community (which I had intended to do anyway)... but how do you "install it manually"?

http://www.ncrunch.net/documentation/V3/manual-installation-instructions

Maybe i overlook this in a other thread, why you are not using a vsix for the installation? This should solve these kind of problems.

VSIX have their own complications in terms of support and maintenance.

The VSIX format is different between versions of VS, so we'd need a whole different install strategy for each different VS version. I expect there will also be limitations that will create trade-offs.

These problems are probably not insurmountable but still have a price attached to them.

I don't think that there are many problems with the VSIX Installer. Because the manual deployment is simply Copy & Paste, Unlocking Files, starting devenv. So nothing special. From that Side i can't imagine problems for that.

Now you are putting the unhandy work of manuell installation to every User with multple instances of Visual Studio 2017. Which may lead that some customer saying, this is annoying. No worth the effort, because i allready have Live Unittesting in my edition.

Think about first time users who would like test NCrunch. They install NCrunch, then start an instance of Visual Studio 2017... and nothing visible, no NCrunch ... oh, what a peace of sh*t ... uninstalling. you may have lost a new customer.

With the VS2017 VISX Format (older Version can still use the old MSI), so you have only support one extra format for the VS2017 lifetime. With VSIX you don't need an Install Strategy, do it like the vsix way.
Also you can even ngen the extgension assemblies, which may lead to performance improvements.

Also to think about, there is a 3.10.2 Preview Version of NCrunch, which has a workaround for the multiple marker problem (have this allday). But i will not test this before the final release, because to much hassle to update.

Der-Albert.com wrote:I don't think that there are many problems with the VSIX Installer. Because the manual deployment is simply Copy & Paste, Unlocking Files, starting devenv. So nothing special. From that Side i can't imagine problems for that.

Now you are putting the unhandy work of manuell installation to every User with multple instances of Visual Studio 2017. Which may lead that some customer saying, this is annoying. No worth the effort, because i allready have Live Unittesting in my edition.

Think about first time users who would like test NCrunch. They install NCrunch, then start an instance of Visual Studio 2017... and nothing visible, no NCrunch ... oh, what a peace of sh*t ... uninstalling. you may have lost a new customer.

With the VS2017 VISX Format (older Version can still use the old MSI), so you have only support one extra format for the VS2017 lifetime. With VSIX you don't need an Install Strategy, do it like the vsix way.
Also you can even ngen the extgension assemblies, which may lead to performance improvements.

Understood. Say rather that I am not disagreeing VSIX is a solution, more that the priority of this needs to be weighed relative to other things as in the broader context, work on even the simplest of installers always takes far longer than expected. It would probably make sense to track this in uservoice.