Razorleaf Corporation » Platform Technologies Articles

Searching Tip: Context

Jonathan Scott — Tue, 11 Jan 2011 03:29:48 +0000

Are you ready to take your search capabilities to the next level? If you’re like many professionals today, you’re inundated by information at work, and sifting Read More...

Custom Context Menu Entries in Windows 7

Kevin Carpenter — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 19:00:26 +0000

As developers, we’re known to tweak things to get them just exactly like we want them. So here’s a quick tip on getting your own menu Read More...

ENOVIA SmarTeam .NET Problems

Jonathan Scott — Thu, 28 Oct 2010 20:52:56 +0000

Multiple ENOVIA SmarTeam versions are currently experiencing problems as a result of a series of Microsoft Windows Updates published earlier this year. Specifically, the problems are related to several SmarTeam executables, including SmarTeam Editor, the SmarTeam Workflow Service, and other SmarTeam executables. The core problem is that Microsoft appears to have changed their implementation of some garbage collection code in all versions of the .NET Framework, and this code is fundamental to a number of applications like SmarTeam. Therefore, users (of SmarTeam as well as of other software packages) are experiencing errors and abnormal termination of programs after applying the problematic Windows Updates. The current resolution is not to deploy these Windows Updates while Dassault issues service packs and hot fixes to address the problem.

Identifying the Problem

These problems can be experienced on ENOVIA SmarTeam V5R18, V5R19, and V5R20. It is possible that V5R17 and earlier are impacted, but since those versions are no longer actively supported by Dassault, information on these versions is not tracked/available on the Dassault Systemes support website. The following Windows Update packages (at a minimum) are known to cause the problem:

KB976576 for .NET 2.0
KB977354 for .NET 3.0
KB953595 for .NET 3.5

.NET Framework 4.0 also contains the problem, but 4.0 is not officially certified by Dassault for ENOVIA SmarTeam yet anyway. Although these specific KBs are known to cause the problem, a number of other KBs have been reported as problematic as well. It seems that some later KBs reference the aforementioned KBs as prerequisites, and that other KBs may include the same .NET changes that cause the problem, but just rolled up into a different Windows Update. These KBs are also believed to cause the problem:

KB2418241
KB982524
KB2416473

You can recognize that you are experiencing this problem if you receive this error message: "DDE server Window: SmarTeam.exe Application error"

Tracking the Problem

It appears that responsibility for resolving the problem will rest with application vendors like Dassault, and that Microsoft will not be adjusting/recalling any of these updates. A number of software packages were impacted by these changes (like Intuit's QuickBooks, DocuWare's DocuWare, and Sage's Timberline Office), and none indicate a resolution pending that involves Microsoft. So, the only tracking available for resolutions to this SmarTeam problem is via Dassault, and the following tracking numbers should be helpful in staying abreast of the situation:

QA00000006227
BR10000094968
BR10000096194
APAR HD97824
APAR HD98941

Resolving the Problem

The only confirmed comprehensive solution to the problem currently is to avoid installing Windows Updates that make the problematic changes to the .NET Framework. For many customers, it has been possible to remove the offending Windows Updates to resolve the problem, but this has not been shown to be effective in all cases. Dassault indicates that they have partially resolved the problem in V5R20 Service Pack 4, but that a hotfix on top of this service pack will be required to fully resolve the problem for all customers. Dassault is also working on generic hotfixes for V5R19 SP4 and higher and V5R20 SP2 and higher. Customer-specific hotfixes will be required for those customers using other hotfixes in their environment. Please let us know if you know of other ways to identify problematic Windows Update packages, or have found additional ways to resolve this problem. We recognize that such a fundamental and universal change by Microsoft will take significant time and energy for Dassault to resolve, so please watch out for this problem if it has not impacted you yet - it may be several more weeks before Dassault has permanent solutions for all active customers.

32-bit and 64-bit ASP.NET

Paul Luc — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 02:54:14 +0000

Many developers struggle with the use of 32-bit and 64-bit address spaces. In a nutshell, 32-bit assemblies cannot be loaded within 64-bit address spaces and 64-bit Read More...

Defragmenting VMs for Performance

Jonathan Scott — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 20:30:08 +0000

If you’ve worked with virtualization long enough, you may have noticed that performance can degrade over time. This phenomenon is related to disk fragmentation, particularly in Read More...

CAD and Virtualization

Daniel Rohats — Wed, 31 Mar 2010 17:00:10 +0000

Virtualization has progressed considerably in the past few years, but graphics performance has been notoriously poor because VMs (virtual machines) have been unable to take advantage of the Read More...

Accessing Virtual Disks Via Windows

Steve Dunn — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 14:30:24 +0000

One of the often overlooked features of VMWare Workstation is the Virtual Disk Mapping utility. Available through the standard VMware Workstation GUI, the tool maps a Read More...

What’s New VMware Workstation 7

Michael Craffey — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 17:30:51 +0000

You skipped Windows Vista, and now you really want to see if Windows 7 is worth the leap. Or maybe you may want to test SQL Read More...

What’s New VMware Workstation 7

Michael Craffey — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 17:30:51 +0000

You skipped Windows Vista, and now you really want to see if Windows 7 is worth the leap. Or maybe you may want to test SQL Read More...

The Value of VM Players

Derek Neiding — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 13:30:59 +0000

Virtualization has many benefits, and we at Razorleaf are big advocates of the technology. Internally, we leverage workstation virtualization products, and several of our clients make Read More...