Troubleshooting BI Publisher Desktop

I already had a draft title in my blogs folder, but never finished to write it. When I got this strange behavior again I decided to finish this post.

Sometime my BI Pubisher Desktop doesn't want to work in my configuration -
Macbook Pro with VMware Fusion:
- Windows 2003 SP1 (and hotfixes)
- Word 2003
- .NET framework 2.0
- J2RE 1.4.2 and JRE 6U3

Important to know is that you need to install especially the last two points (.NET 2.0 and Java).


First things I always check if it doesn't work:

- Did a Windows update had place?
I've put this update system to manual now, but default it's checking for updates and most of the people just install it (as I did before).

- Is the .NET Framework still working?
I installed .Net Paint and try if that still works.

- Is my Java environment still correct.
Again you can test that with a program or trying to run java from the command prompt.

- Can I still load the xml data file and add a field to the document?
for ex. select "All Fields" from the BIP Desktop toolbar in MS Word to include all fields/column/items/node (or whatever you call it) of the xml files in your document.

When one of the above doesn't work, it's probably best to reinstall the specific component.

However, for me all the above works! But if I double-click on a field to get to the BIP specific options/menu it doesn't work anymore. It tries to load the .net stuff but it looks like it fails at a certain point. The same happens when you want to add a conditional region, BIP Desktop fires up .NET and then nothing (you don't get the expected screen of BIP Desktop).

In my case the resolution was simple... I was calling the xml file from a network drive or a shared drive in my VM. As long as I called it from there it didn't work, but if I put the xml data file on my desktop or in another folder of my local hard drive it did work.

Sometimes it's something you don't expect and a very naughty thing ;-)