Ship WinDbg Preview outside of the Windows Store

aluhrs13 commented 5 years ago

Many people are unable to use WinDbg Preview due to their enterprises disabling access to the Microsoft Store or needing it in production environments where they can’t use Store applications. The top reason for us shipping via the store initially was to enable us to easily ensure everyone had the latest version. We’re shipping updates fairly often and we already have issues with people using 7+ year-old versions of WinDbg and reporting issues on them that have long since been fixed, so we want to ensure that it’s effortless to be using the latest bits.

We’ve stabilized quite a bit and we’re comfortable making it easier to get to the “xcopy install” as an option for people who want or need that, and we want to offer a method of auto-updating without access to the Store. Our current plan that we’re looking at releasing an MSIX possibly with an AppInstaller. That’ll give the options of you downloading and extracting the MSIX for a portable install that can be copied anywhere, or installing the MSIX to receive updates automatically.

We want to make sure this will work for the situations that are blocked today and still looking at other options, so feel free to leave any comments if you think this is a good direction, or if we’re missing your scenario.

crispinwright commented 5 years ago

Sold, where do I sign? Nice one Andy.

rbeex commented 5 years ago

Im working in an enterprise development environment. Windows Store is disabled by our admins and therefore i can´t preview "WinDbg Preview". I also request this feature.

randomascii commented 5 years ago

I would definitely be more inclined to use WinDbg Preview, and give feedback on it, if it was made available outside of the store. Right now I would have to install it on a personal machine, extract the install directory, and then copy that to my corporate workstation. This feels like more shenanigans than I truly want.

dss539 commented 5 years ago

Yes please provide this. The type of person who would even use WinDbg is very familiar with manual updates. We don't need the store to handle that for us.

It would be ideal if you release it as a chocolatey package.

amithegde commented 5 years ago

Providing an installer or hosting the tool on MS Store is not useful for power users. What we need is a single .exe which we can copy around just like the SysInternals tools. Installing from the Microsoft Store experience is good for applications like solitaire.

I can give example of good update model adopted by 3 tools:

ConEmu: I use a portable version which asks me to update if there is an update available whenever I open the tool
VSCode: doesn't seem to have a portable version, comes with a pretty decent update functionality
ILSpy: portable application with releases on github

jessemckenna commented 5 years ago

It would be awesome to see this happen! I'm a new developer trying to learn WinDBG, and I would love to learn on the new version, but I can't while it's locked behind the Microsoft Store. I've heard Preview is an easier user experience, so I really want to check it out. Thanks for pushing for this!

rtischer8277 commented 4 years ago

I waste three dev hours trying to get WinDbg Preview to work by downloading it from the Store and when that didn't work (the PIN challenge failed repeatedly), I attempted to download using the VS installer. Still didn't work. WinDbg Preview works fine on another machine where I downloaded it a month ago or so.

mchabot2048 commented 4 years ago

I'd appreciate an outside-of-store method for getting Windbg Preview. I've been trying to get it installed in the lab to analyze a problem but the Store method is failing and I can't figure out why. I've tried getting support via my VS/MSDN subscription but it seems that there isn't support for it or Support doesn't know who is supposed to support Store install problems

rtischer8277 commented 4 years ago

I'd appreciate an outside-of-store method for getting Windbg Preview. I've been trying... I no longer see a way to download it outside the store. The noose tightens. I also checked Feedback Hub and found "unable to download WINDBG" preview. This was posted Dec 15, 2019, so pretty new. MS's answer: "We've got it". No explanations for what is going on.

amithegde commented 4 years ago

One workaround I did is to download from store on a windows 10 device and then find the location of the process and copy it over to other devices.

Thumbs down for making it so cumbersome.

wjbaker1 commented 4 years ago

I would also like a way to download the WinDbg Preview to a thumb drive to transfer to another machine. I can't download from Windows store on my company PC (likely disabled by policy). I did download on my personal PC but couldn't transfer the .EXE to a thumb drive. I ended up just copying 1 dump file to the personal computer and analyzing it there.

randomascii commented 4 years ago

Note that it is actually possible to do this yourself. See this twitter thread:

https://twitter.com/M_Cedervall/status/1229186171999334400

I'm not quite sure how it works but using the linked scripts you can download the Windbg Preview package and then install it, all on a machine without store access. It should stay updated.

canhazcodez commented 3 years ago

and here I thought I'd finally get a solution to the problem of not having access to the store. As "enterprise networks" are, sometimes, not only is the store blocked, but twitter too, so I can't read the solution that @randomascii linked. grrrrr

randomascii commented 3 years ago

The twitter thread mostly says that you can use this script to download apps without using the store:

https://github.com/MattiasC85/Scripts/blob/master/OSD/Download-AppxFromStore.ps1

You'll need the store identifier which can usually be found with a quick Google search. Here's the one for Windbg Preview:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/windbg-preview/9pgjgd53tn86?atc=true

I haven't tried these steps for a long time so I don't remember any details, and it apparently fails for some people, so, good luck.

darkguy2008 commented 3 years ago

While the workaround is appreciated, it is NOT the solution to the issue. Come on MS, providing a power tool in the Microsoft Store where you know that some companies have it disabled (and it's even disabled by default in your own LTSC installs) ? This is plain ridiculous.

WowItsDoge commented 3 years ago

It would bei really cool, if WinDbg Preview was available outside of the Windows store. Some companies have disabled the store, but this tool would bei usefull for a lot of debbuging sessions.

Strandedpirate commented 3 years ago

3-19-2021 - you literally can't install this hot garbage from the MS store. Throws an HTTP 500 error. Clearly there must be something wrong with it for them to intentionally ignore our inability to install the stupid thing.

rmliu commented 3 years ago

store identifier for Windbg Preview: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/windbg-preview/9pgjgd53tn86

RedWingBB commented 3 years ago

Once again, I had a situation where windbg preview could have been a great help The problem showed on an Azure instance but not my development machine I tried to use the windows store to install it When I attempted to get it from the windows store to the azure instance, the install wouldnt procede because it wanted to direct the app to my base machine, where I had installed windbg preview before

Please - make a portable version that could be unzipped, for situations in the field We cant install visual studio on customer machines

sdmf74 commented 3 years ago

Still cannot download windbg preview on latest version of windows 10 pro. Any other way to open memory.dmp files?

gwillcox-r7 commented 3 years ago

Still cannot download windbg preview on latest version of windows 10 pro. Any other way to open memory.dmp files?

You can install the normal version of WinDBG using the Debugging Tools for Windows which should still be able to open .dmp files.

darkguy2008 commented 3 years ago

Still cannot download windbg preview on latest version of windows 10 pro. Any other way to open memory.dmp files?

You can install the normal version of WinDBG using the Debugging Tools for Windows which should still be able to open .dmp files.

Thanks, but this is not what we're asking for.

gwillcox-r7 commented 3 years ago

@darkguy2008 Agreed, however I was just trying to answer @sdmf74's question. You can see I clearly quoted his original post to post my response. Please don't assume I was trying to answer the question in this thread as a whole: I fully agree with your point that WinDBG Preview needs to work on other OS's, I was merely trying to help someone with a workaround for their specific situation until a more proper solution can be implemented.

darkguy2008 commented 3 years ago

@darkguy2008 Agreed, however I was just trying to answer @sdmf74's question. You can see I clearly quoted his original post to post my response. Please don't assume I was trying to answer the question in this thread as a whole: I fully agree with your point that WinDBG Preview needs to work on other OS's, I was merely trying to help someone with a workaround for their specific situation until a more proper solution can be implemented.

Oh! Alright, I may have been too harsh it seems, sorry for the confusion :) makes sense, and I also agree with you!

MV10 commented 3 years ago

2+ years later...

MikeDiack commented 2 years ago

This is bananas. It's now 2.5 years since the original post and:

a) The preview build is still in preview??! (a 2.5+ year beta cycle?!?!). Is it ever gonna be productionised/shipped? b) The ability to get the code, without relying on the Store (the original point of this issue), has not been addressed...

What on earth?

MikeDiack commented 2 years ago

Is WinDbg Preview still actively even being worked on? It surely cannot take 2.5 years to released it! I notice the original release was Aug 2017 - 4.25 years ago!

MV10 commented 2 years ago

Worse, I work for one of Microsoft's largest customers, and several colleagues and I use WinDbg at least weekly, if not daily. We were interviewed back when the rewrite was planned, we specifically spoke out against the plan to use the Store for distribution, and apparently nobody cared. It's a big problem. (Frankly, the wonky naming, updating, and installation of all Store-based "modern" apps is a big problem.)

It would be nice if this product was open-sourced, too. It isn't like it's some highly proprietary money-maker.

ge0rdi commented 2 years ago

The ability to get the code, without relying on the Store (the original point of this issue), has not been addressed...

https://twitter.com/timmisiak/status/1456278428466905097

So it seems there is at least a plan.

Is WinDbg Preview still actively even being worked on?

https://twitter.com/timmisiak/status/1454217382998675459 https://twitter.com/timmisiak/status/1456289454453182473

I'd recommend to follow the guy. He is working on WinDbg and seems to drop bit of info now and then.

It surely cannot take 2.5 years to released it!

Honestly, just forget about the "preview" part in the name and use it. I find new WinDbg so much better than old one and can only recommend it.

ge0rdi commented 2 years ago

Regarding installation without access to MS Store check this article: https://randomascii.wordpress.com/2021/11/12/windows-performance-analyzer-from-store-or-sdk/

It is about Windows Performance Analyzer not WinDbg but similar can be used to download WinDbg Preview package.

RedWingBB commented 2 years ago

Its unfortunate more energy isnt being put into windbg preview

The useability of it is better than windbg and i find its somewhat more effective at examining DMP files as well, and quite a bit better at DMP than Visual Studio

If it could be placed on a machine by unzip, that is without an install, it would be a valuable debugging tool in the field

disklosr commented 2 years ago

I know the problem is still not yet solved. In the meantime, it' actually quite easy to get yourself a portable copy of WinDbg preview. Here's how:

Go to: https://store.rg-adguard.net/
Choose productId from the drop down, then input the store product id of WinDbg which is 9pgjgd53tn86
Click on the tick button and give it a few seconds
The website should display direct download links (check that links are pointing to Microsoft servers just to be sure)
Download the appx file (should be the last one on the list)
DO NOT try to install it by running the appx file, instead, just unzip it to a folder and voilà! your portable version of WinDbg is ready to be used.

RedWingBB commented 2 years ago

Thanks for these steps - they worked.

RedWingBB commented 2 years ago

One more comment; The above steps work, but the download is an Install What is needed in the field is an XCopy type package, for instance a simple Zip with the necessary components Debugging complex situations in the field cant be doing Installs A shame this useful tool isn't getting more attention

RedWingBB commented 2 years ago

One more last comment After following steps as outlined by disklosr, the command to start windbg preview is DbgX.Shell.exe

Seikilos commented 2 years ago

Tricky, found some website that explained to me how to download the latest msixbundle (currently Microsoft.WinDbg_1.2206.19001.0_neutral_~_8wekyb3d8bbwe.Msixbundle)

After powershelling and calling Add-AppxPackage I now see "WinDBG Preview" on my start menu. 'Yay'. But I cannot run it. I cklick on it, see a small progress bar on the start menu entry and then nothing. Checking Event Viewer -> /Applications and Services/Microsoft/Windows/Store/Operational

tells me something with a license acquisition failure due to network resolution.

Failure Message: hr: 0x800704cf
Function: ApplicationLicenseManager::GetLicenseForInstalledPackage
Source: onecoreuap\enduser\winstore\licensemanager\lib\applicensemanager.cpp (260)

So the ms store app infrastructure seems to require a license.

Since the machine is in a corporate environment not only the store is blocked but also some addresses, presumably the license manager endpoint. So for now I seem to be unable to use the Preview Version at all. Too bad, Time Travel Debugging looks great 😐

disklosr commented 2 years ago

@Seikilos do not try to install the package, instead just unzip it and you'll have a portable version of WinDbg ready to run. See my previous answer for more info.

Seikilos commented 2 years ago

@Seikilos do not try to install the package ...

D'oh after I read the first couple of words in the github mail notifcation of your post I just realized the same. ... :D

Thanks for guiding me into the right direction. Extraction worked great 👍

mitsukuri commented 2 years ago

Trying to keep the picks in a toy safe away from those who regard them as tools of the trade is not a very bright idea at the minimum.

Pandaa-P commented 2 years ago

Dear Diary The year is 2022 and Microsoft still didn't Ship WinDbg Preview outside of the Windows Store.

mitsukuri commented 2 years ago

One more comment; The above steps work, but the download is an Install What is needed in the field is an XCopy type package, for instance a simple Zip with the necessary components Debugging complex situations in the field cant be doing Installs A shame this useful tool isn't getting more attention

No problem, there's no need to run the installer, just open .msix (or .appx, or whatever new installer extension that MS extension naming taskforce comes up with tomorrow) as plain zip archive (simply rename it if your tools don't allow opening arbitrary files as archives like e.g. Total Commander does), extract to a directory of your choice, run DbgX.Shell.exe.

lzybkr commented 2 years ago

The team is actively working on this, hopefully I'll have a download link I can share soon.

scdub commented 2 years ago

@lzybkr that's great! In case you have any recalcitrant elements resisting this change, I've made a Venn diagram of WinDbg users to clarify the situation:

windbg

More seriously, I appreciate your efforts and look forward to being able to install WinDbg Preview again on my employer's machines which disallow Store usage.

johan-boule commented 2 years ago

Where does this "xcopy install" terminology come from ? I often read that from MS's in-house people, but what it reminds me of is when IBM-PC enthusiasts used to have to deal with the poor MSDOS. That's circa 80's and early 90's and was confined to nonprofessional circles. Should I also bring my cassette walkman when I "install" your debugger ?

EDIT: people can't read sacarsms... I'm all for a portable install, what I don't like is the tentative spreading of a very tainted terminology. I don't like XCOPY.COM, that stuff smelt bad and brings bad memories of bad PC machines and OS.

MV10 commented 2 years ago

Or perhaps you're just not very good at it.

johan-boule commented 2 years ago

Kinda off topic: I cannot install either the classic WinDbg via the Windows Kit package. When I use the "Apps & Features" UI thingy, the package proposes to click on checkboxes to install it. Fine. But then, on a corporate machine, the installer fails to download it from internet.

Seikilos commented 2 years ago

Kinda off topic: I cannot install either the classic WinDbg via the Windows Kit package. When I use the "Apps & Features" UI thingy, the package proposes to click on checkboxes to install it. Fine. But then, on a corporate machine, the installer fails to download it from internet.

I think in this case you need to xcopy install the package.

adeelahmadk commented 2 years ago

Did anyone try the Windows SDK iso?

lzybkr commented 2 years ago

IIRC, you can extract the installer from the iso, but it's been a few years since I tried that.

aequabit commented 1 year ago

How to use WinDbg Preview without the Microsoft Store:

Disclaimer: I assume your Windows installation has been activated with a proper license, this is not meant to circumvent the Microsoft Store DRM

Copy the Store URL of WinDbg Preview (https://apps.microsoft.com/store/detail/windbg-preview/9PGJGD53TN86)
Use store.rg-adguard.net to get the direct link of the APPX package
Install it by just opening it or via the PowerShell using Add-AppxPackage -Path <APPX package>

If it doesn't work, just extract the package (changing the extension to .zip will give you the context-menu option to do so) and run DbgX.Shell.exe.

microsoftfeedback / WinDbg-Feedback

Ship WinDbg Preview outside of the Windows Store #19