NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL

[philrigby62]

Firstly let me say that I am totally new to NVDA. I only downloaded it for the first time today so please forgive me if my following error report is not up to standards expected on here.

I created a portable copy of NVDA when running the downloaded NVDA installer for the first time on my Windows 7 machine. If I then chose to continue to leave NVDA running, it carried on working OK. However, if I stopped NVDA after the installation of the portable copy and then ran c:\users\<MyUserName>\nvda\nvda.exe, which is where I chose to install the portable copy, NVDA crashes immediately complaining that the following DLL is missing from my computer:

api-ms-win-core-rtlsupport-l1-2-0.dll.

I even tried running the portable nvda.exe from the command prompt with the -l 10 option to get detailed debug logging but that produced nothing at all useful in the $temp%\nvda.log. Because it is so short and so unhelpful, I've just pasted it in here:

INFO - __main__ (11:48:40.575):
Starting NVDA
DEBUG - __main__ (11:48:40.575):
Debug level logging enabled

That's all that is seen in the log file.

I do not want to do a full install on my machine at this stage as I want to try out NVDA in a non-invasive way first. That is why I am trying to use a portable copy.

I'm running Windows version 6.1, build 7601, service pack 1.

[feerrenrut]

Hi, sorry to hear your first experience with NVDA was less than a success, and thanks for taking the time to raise a bug report. Could you confirm for me that you downloaded the latest release of NVDA which is 2017.4?

[feerrenrut]

I am not able to reproduce this myself. I did the following:

• created a new install of Windows 7 home premium 64 bit
• installed Service Pack 1
• tried to create and run a portable copy of 2017.4

This all worked with no errors.

Technical
This post on stack overflow indicates that this issue could be caused by using the wrong visual studio runtime. They indicate that using vcruntime140.dll version 14.11.25415 can cause this problem, the version of vcruntime140.dll we include with NVDA 2017.4 is 14.11.25325, which is the version that did not cause the problem for the stackoverflow question author.

If we could reproduce this issue, then we could use dependency walker to see what version of the DLL is being loaded and where it lives.

[philrigby62]

Yes, I can confirm it was 2017.4 that I downloaded and attempted to use. Phil. From: Reef Turner [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 09 February 2018 00:22 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Author Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) Hi, sorry to hear your first experience with NVDA was less than a success, and thanks for taking the time to raise a bug report. Could you confirm for me that you downloaded the latest release of NVDA which is 2017.4? — You are receiving this because you authored the thread. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC7yDeEfwUOcJPsi1sMMP43_7RZW4hks5tS4-tgaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender.

[philrigby62]

So does it help if I find out which version of Visual Studio runtime is running on my machine? Please remember that I can reproduce this error every time. I have deleted the directory along with all its contents where I had installed the portable copy of NVDA and redownloaded and rerun the installer to create another portable copy. I got exactly the same problem.

If it makes any difference at all, I am running Windows 7 ultimate, not premium. I've been running it for a long time now and Windows updates are always applied. Let me know if there is anything I can checkfor you about my environment.

I am stuck as I do not wish to do a full install of NVDA on this machine at this stage so I do want to get this portable copy working.

Also, please do bear in mind that I said that NVDA continues to work just fine if I leave it running direct from the install. It is simply when I want to stop it to go back to JAWS and then I restart it again that I get the error I have described. For info, I am not at any point trying to run NVDA and JAWS at the same time.

[Brian1Gaff]

If its any consolation to anyone here, the file api-ms-win-core-rtlsupport-l1-2-0.dll. Does not exist on my windows 7 sp1 machine yet nvda portables have always worked fine. As you say, if its working from the archive opened in a temporary area, then one would suspect the same should be the case if its basically copied anywhere else unless something else is going on of course. Never having seen the error, I cannot comment further. Microsoft seems to suggest that the file in question should never be distributed or called directly which means, I suspect that its something else that its actually a part of, perhaps only created as an when needed by a library. As a matter of interest, where did you decide to put the actual copy you are trying to run, Hoopfully in an area you, as the user has access to? Brian

[philrigby62]

Hi Brian. As mentioned in my original post:

"However, if I stopped NVDA after the installation of the portable copy and then ran c:\users<MyUserName>\nvda\nvda.exe, which is where I chose to install the portable copy, ...

And yes of course my user has access to this area.

I can reproduce this error easily and every time. I note that others have said they can't reproduce it. So, where do we go from here? Any other info I can get from my environment that might help you? My NVDA experience is now stalled after only a few minutes of trying to use it.

[Brian1Gaff]

Well to me it looks like it may be a path issue, hence my comment, but really one of the devs really needs to have a look at this one, as I certainly could not make it happen at all. Brian

[LeonarddeR]

@philrigby62: Could you copy your NVDA portable to a folder directory under your c partition and see whether you are able to start the copy from there?

[philrigby62]

Hi, I did this and no, I wasn’t able to start it from the location I copied it to, c:\nvda\nvda.exe. From: Leonard de Ruijter [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 12 February 2018 12:16 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Mention Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) @philrigby62 <https://github.com/philrigby62> : Could you copy your NVDA portable to a folder directory under your c partition and see whether you are able to start the copy from there? — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC7xkC93vP6sdVddP9MLgU_bZqEhn9ks5tUCuCgaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender.

[josephsl]

Hi,

A few things:

[josephsl]

Hi,

A few things:

• Instead of running the installer directly from nvaccess.org, try saving it first, and then run the installer and see if you get the same error.
• The error message suggests a component used by NVDA is looking for an internal DLL Windows API uses for some operations.
• I know that you're not ready to install NVDA, but for this experiment, can you actually try installing NVDA and run the installed copy to see if the error is shown again? If the error is shown, then something other than NVDA has messed up the DLL, and if not, we do need to look at what NVDA is doing as it unpacks the portable copy.
• What anti-malware program (Microsoft Security Essentials, Avast, AVG, etc.) are you running?

Thanks.

[derekriemer]

Has anyone here heard of this DLL?

[josephsl]

Hi, I have. This is an internal library invoked by one or more Windows API functions (or a constituting DLL). I’m thinking that the failure might have to do with winUser.whatever function we get. By the way, for portable copies, %temp% is not the location for NVDA logs; the correct location will be the place where the portable copy is extracted to. Thanks. From: Derek Riemer [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: Monday, February 12, 2018 10:04 PM To: nvaccess/nvda <nvda@noreply.github.com> Cc: Joseph Lee <joseph.lee22590@gmail.com>; Comment <comment@noreply.github.com> Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) Has anyone here heard of this DLL? — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AHgLkFidKmc3hVkFNmgMlfnGZQCZ4kRRks5tUSXCgaJpZM4R-PCa> .

[Brian1Gaff]

Are you sure about that? I've never seen them anywhere else unless this is a recent change, certainly this is the location where my batch file always finds te main log of a copy of nvda just terminated, I've been using it for years.

[Brian1Gaff]

Is this not a dll inside a microsoft runtime library? I'm almost certaoin there is a microsoft page about this that I read ages ago and it was that this dll cannot be called directly, only from the code that microsoft created and its an internal dll.

[philrigby62]

Sorry but this is where the log was from my run of the portable copy. That is a fact. Anyway, this isn’t very relevant towards solving the problem since I found the log and provided its contents. It is the correct log from the run of the portable copy which failed to start. From: Joseph Lee [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 13 February 2018 06:08 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Mention Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) Hi, I have. This is an internal library invoked by one or more Windows API functions (or a constituting DLL). I’m thinking that the failure might have to do with winUser.whatever function we get. By the way, for portable copies, %temp% is not the location for NVDA logs; the correct location will be the place where the portable copy is extracted to. Thanks. From: Derek Riemer [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: Monday, February 12, 2018 10:04 PM To: nvaccess/nvda <nvda@noreply.github.com> Cc: Joseph Lee <joseph.lee22590@gmail.com>; Comment <comment@noreply.github.com> Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) Has anyone here heard of this DLL? — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AHgLkFidKmc3hVkFNmgMlfnGZQCZ4kRRks5tUSXCgaJpZM4R-PCa> . — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC7_T0gC8MIT7T_6eIdByz3jrv7Pseks5tUSangaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender.

[Brian1Gaff]

Do you think that the file for some reasons has had its permissions screwed up and hence its contents cannot be seen by nvda? However if that was the case one would expect the temp copy that runs when you launch the downloaded file to suffer too. that presumably is opened in %temp% is it? After that I was under the impression that the portable creation was just a simple copy of the files to a new folder or drive. As I run windows 7, and have had no issues at least in this line, it needs some more detailed diagnostics. I'm not really willing to mess with file permissions here as its my working machine. Does the temp folder get treated differently to any other folder on the system, ie I wonder if copying the folder to the program files (x86) folder and running it there might be different or even somehow copying the unzipped contents to a folder in the temp folder? I will reiterate though that all logs for me, portable or otherwise go to %temp%, as only the log of failure of the opening of the log file go to the program folder the extracted copy is in. Brian PS my reboot with log of whatever copy was running has always worked. @echo off cd "%temp%" start /WAIT nvda.exe -q start notepad.exe nvda.log rem, this line just kicks its heels for a bit to make sure the log is loaded into notepad before rebooting nvda. ping -n 5 127.0.0.1>nul start nvda.exe exit

[philrigby62]

See my comments within your email below. From: Joseph Lee [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 12 February 2018 18:24 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Mention Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) Hi, A few things: * Instead of running the installer directly from nvaccess.org, try saving it first, and then run the installer and see if you get the same error. Phil: Of course I tried both these methods before posting this issue. * The error message suggests a component used by NVDA is looking for an internal DLL Windows API uses for some operations. * I know that you're not ready to install NVDA, but for this experiment, can you actually try installing NVDA and run the installed copy to see if the error is shown again? If the error is shown, then something other than NVDA has messed up the DLL, and if not, we do need to look at what NVDA is doing as it unpacks the portable copy. Phil: No, I can’t do this. As I stated, it is precisely because I do not want to install NVDA fully that I am trying to use the portable copy at all. It is not any kind of help to me to go ahead and do the full NVDA installation. If I was happy to do this, I would have done it and never bothered reporting this issue. * What anti-malware program (Microsoft Security Essentials, Avast, AVG, etc.) are you running? Phil: Microsoft Security Essentials only. Thanks. — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC76wCCSZaOAmLpPEJZYiGGuDlFrYNks5tUIHBgaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender.

[philrigby62]

I am happy to help if more diagnostic info is required. Please tell me what you would like me to do to gather it. I have done the download from scratch all over again several times now and I always get the situation occurring that I have reported in this issue. Just to repeat, the only thing I do not want to do on this computer is to do a full install of NVDA. This issue I am facing with the portable copy has already done a lot to put me off going any further with NVDA. If we can get this sorted and I can then explore more about NVDA whilst running it from a portable copy, it may help restore some faith in NVDA which , at present, is a bit lacking for me personally. From: Brian Gaff [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 13 February 2018 21:08 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Mention Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) Do you think that the file for some reasons has had its permissions screwed up and hence its contents cannot be seen by nvda? However if that was the case one would expect the temp copy that runs when you launch the downloaded file to suffer too. that presumably is opened in %temp% is it? After that I was under the impression that the portable creation was just a simple copy of the files to a new folder or drive. As I run windows 7, and have had no issues at least in this line, it needs some more detailed diagnostics. I'm not really willing to mess with file permissions here as its my working machine. Does the temp folder get treated differently to any other folder on the system, ie I wonder if copying the folder to the program files (x86) folder and running it there might be different or even somehow copying the unzipped contents to a folder in the temp folder? I will reiterate though that all logs for me, portable or otherwise go to %temp%, as only the log of failure of the opening of the log file go to the program folder the extracted copy is in. Brian PS my reboot with log of whatever copy was running has always worked. @echo off cd "%temp%" start /WAIT nvda.exe -q start notepad.exe nvda.log rem, this line just kicks its heels for a bit to make sure the log is loaded into notepad before rebooting nvda. ping -n 5 127.0.0.1>nul start nvda.exe exit — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC78NqNE3cK72MBBgpLuHclLJT4oA6ks5tUfm7gaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender.

[LeonarddeR]

@philrigby62: I"m sorry to hear that it still has not been possible to fix your issue.

Could you try the following versions of NVDA and report whether it is possible to make a portable copy out of these?

• 2017.3
• 2017.2
• 2017.1

In case all these versions do not work, here is another random older version, 2015.4

[Brian1Gaff]

I also wondered if this machine has been updated through vista to win 7 and sp1 or if it was a clean install of windows7 sp1? There is something i can remember but it was a long while ago now to do with runtime versions and registration of them. I hated Vista! Brian

[michaelDCurran]

After creating the portable copy, navigate to where you created it, and delete the following files:

• msvcp140.dll
• vccorlib140.dll
• vcruntime140.dll

Then try to run the portable copy.
NVDA only needs these files on windows 10, but they may be confusing things on your Windows 7 system.
If this solves the issue we will have to work out a way of ensuring these never exist at runtime on windows 7.

[Brian1Gaff]

But I have windows 7 and so have many others with no issues at all thus far. Brian

[michaelDCurran]

It is most likely a conflict between those dlls and another VC Redistributable package installed system-wide by another application. However I'm actively working on this issue as for those it affects it it is rather serious.

[michaelDCurran]

We realised we may have been using the wrong copy of the redistributable dlls. I have fixed this in the following try build of NVDA:
https://ci.appveyor.com/api/buildjobs/su9dok9xxw0ignui/artifacts/output%2Fnvda_snapshot_try-i7975-14861%2C682b50bb.exe
Please test this build of NVDA on Windows 7, creating a portable copy and running it.
If this does not solve the issue, I do have one more thing I can try tomorrow.

[philrigby62]

The machine in question ran Windows Vista until October 2013. It was not possible to upgrade the machine from 32-bit Vista to 64-bit windows 7 so a clean install of 64-bit Windows 7 Ultimate was performed on it at that time. From: Brian Gaff [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 14 February 2018 16:34 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Mention Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) I also wondered if this machine has been updated through vista to win 7 and sp1 or if it was a clean install of windows7 sp1? There is something i can remember but it was a long while ago now to do with runtime versions and registration of them. I hated Vista! Brian — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC7yyUW_GZI4HMdQz1WBGe8iE4GrAAks5tUwrWgaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender.

[philrigby62]

I very much appreciate this and your suggestion as to what to try. I will certainly follow your advice but please bear with me as I will not be able to do this and report results until at least tomorrow evening UK time due to other commitments. However, thank you for your support in trying to get to the bottom of this issue. The comments from others telling me they cannot recreate the problem have not been as helpful. As I have said, I can recreate it every time. From: Michael Curran [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 15 February 2018 10:04 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Mention Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) It is most likely a conflict between those dlls and another VC Redistributable package installed system-wide by another application. However I'm actively working on this issue as for those it affects it it is rather serious. — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC77iHMKUa0ctUq-LV814OUnkhCES9ks5tVAEdgaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender.

[Brian1Gaff]

This morning I removed those files and nvda still functioned on my windows 7 64 bit machine and now the new update has put them back of cores, again with no ill effects. Brian

[philrigby62]

Fantastic!! That did it. I downloaded this version, chose C:\users\my_user_name_NVDA as the target folder for the portable copy and, after the install completed, as before, I shut down the installation version of NVDA. I then ran c:\users\my_user_name_NVDA\NVDA.exe to run the portable copy I had just installed and it started perfectly. Thanks so much. This has certainly solved my issue here. Can I just say to those who simply told me they couldn’t recreate the problem that it isn’t worth posting such posts unless you can offer actual actions you want the problem reporter to follow to get more diagnostics. I did stress that I could reproduce this error every time and I still can with the 2017.4 version. It is of no help nor of any interest to me that someone looking into the problem cannot recreate it. This fact doesn’t invalidate the issue. The version Michael has provided does work perfectly though. What happens now? Will the fix be accepted into the next release? Regards, Phil. From: Michael Curran [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 15 February 2018 10:35 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Mention Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) We realised we may have been using the wrong copy of the redistributable dlls. I have fixed this in the following try build of NVDA: https://ci.appveyor.com/api/buildjobs/su9dok9xxw0ignui/artifacts/output%2Fnvda_snapshot_try-i7975-14861%2C682b50bb.exe Please test this build of NVDA on Windows 7, creating a portable copy and running it. If this does not solve the issue, I do have one more thing I can try tomorrow. — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC70iS90lCtBAXpL0bpt-YJMQSHMhIks5tVAhjgaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender.

[josephsl]

Hi, yes, it will be fast-tracked for 2018.1. Also, I apologize for attitudes shown by some of our community members when it came to trying to resolve this issue. I will write a message to the community regarding troubleshooting attitudes soon. Thanks. From: philrigby62 [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: Friday, February 16, 2018 1:01 PM To: nvaccess/nvda <nvda@noreply.github.com> Cc: Joseph Lee <joseph.lee22590@gmail.com>; Comment <comment@noreply.github.com> Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) Fantastic!! That did it. I downloaded this version, chose C:\users\my_user_name_NVDA as the target folder for the portable copy and, after the install completed, as before, I shut down the installation version of NVDA. I then ran c:\users\my_user_name_NVDA\NVDA.exe to run the portable copy I had just installed and it started perfectly. Thanks so much. This has certainly solved my issue here. Can I just say to those who simply told me they couldn’t recreate the problem that it isn’t worth posting such posts unless you can offer actual actions you want the problem reporter to follow to get more diagnostics. I did stress that I could reproduce this error every time and I still can with the 2017.4 version. It is of no help nor of any interest to me that someone looking into the problem cannot recreate it. This fact doesn’t invalidate the issue. The version Michael has provided does work perfectly though. What happens now? Will the fix be accepted into the next release? Regards, Phil. From: Michael Curran [mailto:notifications@github.com] Sent: 15 February 2018 10:35 To: nvaccess/nvda Cc: philrigby62; Mention Subject: Re: [nvaccess/nvda] NVDA portable copy will not start, reports missing DLL (#7975) We realised we may have been using the wrong copy of the redistributable dlls. I have fixed this in the following try build of NVDA: https://ci.appveyor.com/api/buildjobs/su9dok9xxw0ignui/artifacts/output%2Fnvda_snapshot_try-i7975-14861%2C682b50bb.exe Please test this build of NVDA on Windows 7, creating a portable copy and running it. If this does not solve the issue, I do have one more thing I can try tomorrow. — You are receiving this because you were mentioned. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AigC70iS90lCtBAXpL0bpt-YJMQSHMhIks5tVAhjgaJpZM4R-PCa> .Image removed by sender. — You are receiving this because you commented. Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#7975 (comment)> , or mute the thread <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/AHgLkMx1OTr7fHUkVltECQHDcXx0ks2Rks5tVex6gaJpZM4R-PCa> .

[Brian1Gaff]

I think the point was that we wanted to find out if some other program was interfering with this process. For some reason this only showed up for you due to you not already having a copy of the needed runtime library as was installed in my original install of windows7 sp1 from the dvd. This had to mean that at some point this file, with confusingly the same name as the needed one did not get on the system and hence the issue. If folk had not said that it was a clean install then I'd have smelled a rat in the joint, so to speak. I think many of the cannot get this problem posts were out of peoples frustration rather than any other reason. Brian