How to Display Help on Running Setup Program with Switches

Last reviewed: January 16, 1997
Article ID: Q132374

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Excel 97 for Windows
Microsoft Excel for Windows 95, version 7.0
Microsoft Office 97 for Windows
Microsoft Office for Windows 95, version 7.0
Microsoft PowerPoint 97 for Windows
Microsoft PowerPoint for Windows 95, version 7.0
Microsoft Project for Windows 95, version 4.1
Microsoft Word 97 for Windows
Microsoft Word for Windows 95, version 7.0

SYMPTOMS

When you run Setup with a slash (/) and a question mark (?), for example

   setup /?

you receive a Setup - Usage dialog box with the following information instead of a dialog box with information about all the possible Setup switches you can use:

   Usage: Setup or Setup /A
   Setup /A runs the Setup program in Administrator mode.

CAUSE

Typically, when you run a command with a slash and a question mark, you receive information on the screen about how to use the command you entered with the different switches available for that command. However, when you perform this action with the Setup program for any of the applications listed above, you receive information about using the /A switch to run the Setup program in Administrator mode, even though there are additional switches that you can use with the Setup program.

Note that when you run Setup with an invalid switch or /? in an earlier version of the applications listed above, you only receive the Setup - Usage dialog box describing the /A switch.

WORKAROUND

To work around this behavior and display a dialog box that describes the different switches available to use with the SETUP.EXE file, run Setup with the slash character and no character following. For example, type:

   setup /

When you click OK, you receive a Setup Error 530 dialog box with the following information:

   This is an invalid command line option:
   /

When you click OK, you receive a dialog box with information about the switches that you can use with the Setup program. To see the description that is displayed, see the "More Information" section below.

Note that this same behavior occurs when you run Setup with any invalid switch such as /x or /xxx.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in the Microsoft products listed at the beginning of this article. We are researching this problem and will post new information here in the Microsoft Knowledge Base as it becomes available.

MORE INFORMATION

When you run Setup with an invalid switch, a Setup--Usage dialog box appears with the following information:

   Usage:

   setup [/A] [/G filename] [/Q[0|1|T]] [/R] [/U[A]] [/Y]

   /A           Administrator mode
   /G filename  Generate logfile of installation activity
   /Q[0|1|T]    Quiet install mode (0 shows exit, 1 hides exit, T hides
                all display)
   /R           Reinstall the applications
   /U[A]        Uninstall the application but leave shared components
                (/UA to remove all)
   /Y           Install without copying files

KBCategory: kbsetup
KBSubcategory: offwin xlwin projwin offwinsetup
Additional reference words: 1.20 4.10 7.00 8.00 8.0 95 97 powerpt excel
word office office97 office95 ppt95 ppt97 word95 word97 off97

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Last reviewed: January 16, 1997
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