Thanks Gary... I am getting on OK so far with TP9... I abandoned using it for metadata related stuff a long time ago and adopted IDimager for that (though the version that was useful v.5 was then disowned by its creator, the reincarnation doesn't even have dual screen support, I continue to use the old one).
Anyhow after my last failure to install I sent in a bug report having read this on the 'installation notes' page.
If you encounter problems during the installation, please send us the Thumbs9Install.log from your user TEMP folder along with your problem report. (If you're not sure where this is, hit Win+R, enter %TEMP%, and hit enter, and Explorer will open it for you). The Win key has the Windows logo (Win logo) and is usually between the Ctrl and Alt keys. If your keyboard doesn't have one, consult the documentation for your keyboard and version of windows, or run the command START %TEMP% from a command prompt. Send this file to support@cerious.com, and be sure to provide a meaningful email subject (such as "Unable to install ThumbsPlus 9 build 3935").I received a reasonably speedy reply which said :-
If the installer for the latest version is unable to uninstall the prior version, and if you cannot uninstall it from Control Panel, then the Windows Installer database is missing the original installer. This is usually caused by some type of registry editor or clean up type program. (Which I avoid at all times.) This error is not caused by ThumbsPlus!
This means that if you have the previous installer for the exact build of ThumbsPlus that was installed last, installing and then running the new installer should fix the trouble.
HOWEVER:
An easier way has been reported to me from other users. I now have a link to a newer M$ uninstall/install fix executable. I have not announced this yet on the pages yet but if we continue to get great results we will put a link on our pages to it. This file was created to fix this issue caused by an error in the Windows installer folder on your system.
http://support.microsoft.com/mats/Program_Install_and_Uninstall/
After this, the new installer should operate correctly.
If you continue to have trouble please let me know!I did this, which essentially seemed to assist the uninstall of the previous version. Not that clear what was happening and it took quite a while to chug through the uninstall.
The good news (i hope) was that the latest beta went in OK and the installation seems fine... It asks stuff about the menu bar on first opening, the phrasing of that seems unclear to me ... I said yes and it gave me my old menu bar with all the 'open in external program' icons in their place. So far all other settings seem to be as I wanted them.
Hope this may help someone else.
A big query is why cerious hasn't posted anything of this on the forum... it really is as though they don't read the posts and there really aren't that many of them.
all best wishes from Greg