Node v11.0 windows installation opting into chocolatey+boxstarter results in infinite reboots

[roa-nyx]

• Version: v11.0
• Platform: Windows 7
• Subsystem:

Apologies if this is the wrong place to report this. But I just tried the windows installer for Node v11.0. There was an option to install build-tooling using chocolatey and boxstarter. It warned me that there would be reboots. After it rebooted over 20 times I kind of figured it was in a permanent reboot cycle so I stopped it. I am on an AD so I'm wondering if maybe there is some conflicting policy or antivirus at work that may be interfering with this process.

I'll try to update this task when I have time to try this on my home machine.

Not sure what more I can provide in the way of a test case..

[Trott]

@nodejs/platform-windows

[nullivex]

I stopped the startup script to prevent a loop. However, it rebooted my computer without warning. This is a bug for sure.

[nullivex]

Back on my computer now. I was able to work around this on Windows 10 64bit. The annoying part where it forces the computer off and looks like a Virus is definitely true and should be fixed, it also didn't give me a chance to save any programs (sort of a force restart it seems). Also, I didn't get a chance to choose about installing boxstarter is that a problem?

Anyway, in order to work around this I did the following steps.

1. Open the start menu
2. Type "Startup Tasks"
3. Open "Startup Tasks"
4. Scroll to the bottom and disable "boxstarter-post-restart.bat"

Hope this helps.

[roa-nyx]

For me I just needed to quickly focus on the window that was about to reboot, and hit Ctrl+C. Knocked it right out. I don't feel comfortable having done that as I don't know if it was in the middle of some sensitive work. Node appears to be working without issue for the time being, but I worried I may be in an inconsistent state.

[nullivex]

@klick-barakgall Yea, I ran the installer and went off to multitask and when I saw power shell pop up it was not until I saw chocolatey that I felt safe that I had not just downloaded a malicious version of the Node installer (my script was running quickly and I couldnt see that it was going to reboot before it was gone)

[Trott]

Surprised no one from @nodejs/platform-windows chimed in yet. Let's try @nodejs/build.

[digitalinfinity]

@joaocgreis can you take a look please? infinite reboots are bad 😞

[joaocgreis]

@klick-barakgall can you see in the console what is being installed when it reboots? This is probably some corner case with some package, can you take a look at the log files in C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\logs or upload them here?

[roa-nyx]

@joaocgreis
choco.summary.log
chocolatey.log

[redwebs]

I installed Node 11 on a Dell laptop with 64 bit Windows 10 and unfortunately choose the Boxstarter install option. I thought the note just said you will have to restart your command window. I saw nothing about computer restarts. Node installed just fine but the Powershell Script rebooted 4 times before I noticed it was in a loop to install a script to keep Windows update from changing things. Since the reboot happens quickly you have to be ready to click on the Powershell window and hit Ctrl-C quickly. You are then prompted to type the text "ENTER" to exit the script.

I then got a Windows message "You must restart your computer to turn off User Account Control". I didn't want UAC turned off but restarted anyway and everything seemed to work and UAC was on.

I did have one program that syncs my Outlook address book with Google contacts that started up with a library error "Cannot open registry Interface{00063001-0000-0000-C000-000000000046}\TypeLib." After several attempts to fix this (including spelunking into the dreaded Windows Registry) I had success by running the repair option on Office installer. (Under Add or Remove Programs).

I doubt Boxstarter works and I don't even want to see that name for while.

[aarsilv]

This happened to me too on my Windows 10 machine. Once rebooting quickly X-out of the boxstarter script. Then press Ctrl+Shift+Esc to open up task manager and select the "Startup" tab where you can right click and disable boxstarter-post-restart.bat.

[alexfung888]

Me too. Reboots forever. Created dozens of install scripts under BuildPackages, every one of them reads:

choco upgrade -y python2
choco upgrade -y visualstudio2017buildtools
choco upgrade -y visualstudio2017-workload-vctools

I guess python2 is never installed properly. When using nodejs, I get in gyp errors with pythrons all the time, but it seems ok to ignore them, except that it now keeps rebooting the machine (and needs me to type password too).

I also get a strange directory called regid.1991-06.com.microsoft with two .swidtag files inside.

To exit the loop, control break and type

cleanup-Boxstarter

to undo its other temp changes (disable UAC, disable Windows update, etc).

PS: I got the problem with LTS Node 10. I think it has nothing to do with Node version, just the way it is using boxstarter to install tools.