MSIX Troubleshooting Notes

[Jonathan1095]

Sharing some of my MSIX App Attach Troubleshooting notes for the community.  Ideally consider using disk management to create the VHD(x) file and format.  

Packaging to MSIX fails...

• Consider using the PsFTooling App in the Windows Store. 
  http://ms-windows-store://pdp/?ProductId=9nc6k0q954jv 
  (Please Copy / Paste URL above as the ":" proceeding 'store' will get dropped)
• Review the Log Files
  <https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/msix/packaging-tool/tool-known-issues>MSIX Packaging Tool Known Issues and Troubleshooting Tips - MSIX | Microsoft Docs Log files:

%localappdata%\packages\Microsoft.MsixPackagingTool_8wekyb3d8bbwe\LocalState\DiagOutputDir\

Extracting MSIX to VHD(x)...

• Open disk management, click on Action, and Create VHD
• Settings to consider, Location, VHDX, Dynamic and size should be enough to extract the image at least. Consider something just enough but not so small the extraction may error or you will have to reconfigure the VHD.
• Run the following with the MSIXmgr tool

msixmgr -Unpack -packagePath "<path>\<filename>.msix" -destination "<VHD Drive>:\apps" -applyacls -rootDirectory apps

Can't add MSIX package in portal...

1. Ensure the first VM in the Host Pool is running

2. Ensure a client VM can access the file share with a standard user account.

3. Verify the code signing certificate is in the "Trusted People" store (self-signed) or "Trusted Publishers" (Public / Enterprise) on the client VMs and the correct certificate.
   NOTE: Refer to PKI documentation when using Public or Enterprise certs which are recommended over Self-Signed!

4. Mount VHD(x) and ensure folder structure has root folder (can be any name) with package folder inside of that.
   i.e. E:\apps\VSCode_1.54.3.0_x64__2fr50c84ssct6

5. Try installing the application by double-clicking the MSIX package file itself. Look for any certificate or other errors when installing.

[#2]

#4 solved the problem I was having. If you ever see the error: Error: Msix structure error: No parent folder found for MSIX package, it means what it says, you didn't create the parent folder. It is in the documentation, but easy to miss.