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How do I know???? Project Professional Versions and Consistency

BY: Collin Quiring

The February Cumulative Update was recently released for Project Professional 2010.  As with most updates, this brings a few questions to mind.

How do I know which version, or build, of Project Professional 2010 is on my computer?

How do I know which version, or build, is the latest one available?

From the Project Server perspective, how do I restrict the Project Professional version my users are using to access the server?

Why does that matter?

When Project Professional and Project Server are released to the world and it begins to get a large installation base and is in everyday use all sorts of scenarios and usage variations are implemented by the people using the tools.  In so doing, some unintended consequences occur, some bugs are found and some “business realities” or “business logic issues” are discovered that aren’t part of the current version of Project.  As other integrated tools, like SharePoint, are modified in some way then Project also needs to be modified.  Therefore, updates are released for the software.

As software updates are released, these issues are resolved.  And, so it is important that all the users have the most recent version of Project Professional installed on their computers.  While most organizations have a process to update software, it isn’t always easy to know if everybody accessing your server has the most recent version.  Even if you don’t use Project Server, it is still important for everybody to be using the same version of Project.  What if a user has two copies or Project Professional – one on a desktop computer that is definitely part of the routine update process and a company issued notebook that they don’t always get updated?

And, again, why does this matter?  Why do I care if they all have the same version of Project Professional?  Let’s have a made-up example where there is a bug in Project where every time a Task Name has the letter “R” in it the system changes that to a “3”.  Well, that would be fixed in an update.  And, everybody that updates their version of Project to the latest version would no longer experience that problem.  However, if somebody does NOT update their version, opens a previously fine file and makes a change and then saves it, their version might affect all the “R” characters and make them “3’s” again.  This causes increased frustration as users have to determine if there is a new bug or if somebody has an older version – and, they have to figure out who has that version.  All of that work is in addition to having to correct all the project files that are affected.

So, how do I know which version of Project Professional 2010 is on my computer?

With most things Microsoft, there are many ways to determine this but the easiest way is to open Project, go to File and then Help.  On the right hand side of the screen is the “About Microsoft Project”.  There is also a link that says “Additional Version and Copyright Information”.  This is an important link.

In my case, BEFORE THE FEBRUARY UPDATE, the screen looks like this:

And, the important piece is when I click on the link:

The important piece of information here is the Build Number, the first number in the top row of the About information box.

In this case, before installing the February update, I am using build 14.0.4751.1000.  So, if you are not using Project Server, or if you just want to know, you can ask everybody to go to their computer, open Project Professional and look at this to determine which version they are using.

If you are using Project Server 2010, there is a setting that allows you to restrict the Project Professional build that people are using to access the Server.  In the Server Settings, Additional Server Settings, Project Professional Versions text box you can enter the version that you want users to have.  This will be the “oldest” version that you allow users to have when connecting.

In this example, BEFORE the update, I am requiring version 14.0.2215.1000.

But, now that the February CU is available, I want everybody to have that version.  So, all I have to do is modify this field to the latest version.  After modifying and clicking Save this is the new requirement. NOTE – it takes effect immediately, so don’t make this change until you have either warned your users this change is coming or you are fairly confident that everybody is on the new version.  And, it would be nice to notify your Help Desk about the error messages that will be produced by Project (shown below).

Since I want to use the February CU, I will change this field to say 14.0.5315.5000 since that is the new build number.  How did I know that?  I explain that a bit later as well.

Now, if a Project Professional client attempts to get to my server with a version that is not at least 14.0.5315.5000 they will get an error.  And, this is why it is nice to warn the users and your Help Desk that this is coming – the error message is a bit cryptic.  When the user tries to sign into Project Server, they will get this error message.  Error ID 12015(0x2EEF) with Error Description “An internal error occurred.”  These do not just jump out at you and tell you that it is an error that came from the version change.  It looks like this:

However, if you click on More Info, you do get a bit more information.  Notice that in the message it says that this is an UnsupportedProjectProfessionalVersion – which is what we would expect.

And, just to be thorough, if the user clicks on More Info or not, they get a second error box that says that the Enterprise Global template could not be retrieved and that there might be a database error.  While we know that is not the case, it sounds like a very bad thing and may cause widespread panic.  Ok, maybe just a lack of trust in the database.

However, once the Project Professional client is updated to the February CU, then no errors will appear.

What does Project Professional look like AFTER the February CU is applied?  Well, the first screen looks the same.  It still shows version 14.0.5128.5000:

However, when clicking on the Additional Version link, I get a different result, showing the new build number 14.0.5135.5000:

That answers the version questions and the compliance issue.  But, how did I know which version to use for Project Server?  I guess one way would be to implement the update and just look at the version.  But, that isn’t always precise because there might be a difference between 32-bit and 64-bit versions or there might be some other modification to the system that you are looking at that gives you a different version number.

The best way to know the correct version number is to look at the KB article that Microsoft provides.  For the February CU, the article is located at:  http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2496946.  That article also gives information about what the update includes but it also gives the version information.  That is copied here:

x86

Download information

Collapse this tableExpand this table

File name File version File size Date Time Platform
Project2010-kb2496946-fullfile-x86-glb.exe 14.0.5136.5000 8,057,648 03-Feb-2011 23:55 x86

Microsoft Windows Installer .msp file information

Collapse this tableExpand this table

File name File version File size Date Time Platform
Project-x-none.msp Not Applicable 7,500,800 03-Feb-2011 13:22 Not Applicable

After the hotfix is installed, the global version of this hotfix has the file attributes, or a later version of the file attributes, that are listed in the following table:

Project-x-none.msp information

Collapse this tableExpand this table

File name File version File size Date Time Platform
Atlconv.dll 14.0.5130.5000 286,040 18-Nov-2010 14:11 x86
Pj11od11.dll 14.0.5130.5000 572,840 16-Nov-2010 17:26 x86
Serconv.dll 14.0.5130.5000 408,952 16-Nov-2010 17:26 x86
Winproj.exe 14.0.5135.5000 13,874,528 21-Jan-2011 12:19 x86

x64

Download information

Collapse this tableExpand this table

File name File version File size Date Time Platform
Project2010-kb2496946-fullfile-x64-glb.exe 14.0.5136.5000 10,099,544 04-Feb-2011 01:07 x86

Microsoft Windows Installer .msp file information

Collapse this tableExpand this table

File name File version File size Date Time Platform
Project-x-none.msp Not Applicable 9,556,992 03-Feb-2011 14:05 Not Applicable

After the hotfix is installed, the global version of this hotfix has the file attributes, or a later version of the file attributes, that are listed in the following table:

Project-x-none.msp information

Collapse this tableExpand this table

File name File version File size Date Time Platform
Atlconv.dll 14.0.5130.5000 384,856 18-Nov-2010 14:18 x64
Pj11od11.dll 14.0.5130.5000 754,088 16-Nov-2010 18:05 x64
Serconv.dll 14.0.5135.5000 591,736 19-Jan-2011 16:47 x64
Winproj.exe 14.0.5135.5000 20,816,224 21-Jan-2011 12:26 x64
Winproj.man Not Applicable 3,474 19-Jan-2011 16:37 Not Applicable

Since we were using the 64-bit version for this example and since I was looking at the Project Professional information in File, Help, the pertinent information to me is the File Version for Winproj.exe.

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