Power Pack 1 and Tab Manager

With the recent public release the Release Candidate of Windows Home Server Power Pack 1 it is imperative that any users of Tab Manager take special care when upgrading to avoid being incessantly nagged.

Problem

Due to changes in the way the Console in Power Pack 1 loads tabs and the way I hid tabs from the pre-PP1 tab loader, some add-ins may cause Tab Manager to crash on startup as well as see duplicate tabs within the console.

This situation is especially likely if any Microsoft tabs were put under the control of Tab Manager.

Solution

It is highly suggested that all users of Tab Manager use it to restore all tabs to their normal state and only then uninstall Tab Manager prior to upgrading to Power Pack 1 (RC or final), to do so:

1. Launch the Home Server Console
2. Launch Settings
3. Select the Tab Manager tab
4. Make sure the "Hide Microsoft Assemblies" check box is unchecked
5. Double click on each item listed in the "Managed Assemblies" list until the list is empty
6. Click the OK button
7. Click Yes to on Restart Required prompt
8. Re-launch the Home Server Console
9. Launch Settings
10. Select the Add-ins Tab
11. Locate Tab Manager from list of currently installed add-ins and click it's Uninstall button
12. Restart the Home Server Console

Note that if you have already installed the Power Pack 1 beta and you are seeing messages on startup of the console that certain Microsoft tabs (displayed as HomeServerConsoleTab.TabManager.Health.dll, HomeServerConsoleTab.TabManager.People.dll, HomeServerConsoleTab.TabManager.Sharing.dll, or HomeServerConsoleTab.TabManager.Storage.dll) you will need to manually remove them yourself after logging into your Home Server with Remote Desktop in order to remove the error as after Power Pack 1 is installed, Tab Manager is unable to over write the existing files (by design in Tab Manager for safety)).

Failure to restore the tabs to their original state prior to installation or deleting these files (if necessary) will not break your Home Server, it will instead lead to less than desirable operation through excessive warning messages on startup and some duplicated tabs.

If there are any questions on this issue feel free to post questions here or email me directly.

Update 7/25/2008:

For those who have encountered this issue with Power Pack 1 and were unable to use the above steps before installing Power Pack 1 you will instead have to do the following:

1. Log into your Windows Home Server with Remote Desktop (or log in locally with a keyboard, mouse and monitor if applicable).
2. Navigate to the server's C:\Program Files\Windows Home Server\ directory.
3. Identify all files that match the following pattern: HomeServerConsoleTab.TabManager.*.dll (where * is a wild-card for any name)
4. Rename all files noted in step 3 so as to remove the 'TabManager.' section (ie renaming HomeServerConsoleTab.TabManager.SomeAddin.dll to HomeServerConsoleTab.SomeAddin.dll)
5. Relaunch the Home Server Console to view tabs in their original, Tab Managerless state.
6. Uninstall Tab Manager through the Admin Console if not already done.

If while renaming a file Windows reports that a file with the new name already exists, this is likely due to an updated copy file of the file having been installed, meaning that the file with 'TabManager' in the filename is the older version which can be delete (or preferably moved to another directory temporarily in case it is needed).