Network challenged machine

[miles-smiles]

I apologize if this isn't the right place for this question but I'm having a problem running Terminal from a machine with no network access. I installed the Terminal app using an msix bundle file (by double-clicking the file and by the Add-AppxPackage command). The installation seemed to work but the app won't launch due to the lack of network access. There was an issue (#14539) that was closed but either it wasn't resolved or my use case is slightly different.

Is there a reason why the terminal app needs network access for manual installations? Or perhaps is there a dependency that's missing? I'd love to use it with WSL.

The bundle file is Microsoft.WindowsTerminal_3001.21.10351.0_neutral_~_8wekyb3d8bbwe.Msixbundle.

[maly977]

I apologize if this isn't the right place for this question but I'm having a problem running Terminal from a machine with no network access. I installed the Terminal app using an msix bundle file (by double-clicking the file and by the Add-AppxPackage command). The installation seemed to work but the app won't launch due to the lack of network access. There was an issue (#14539) that was closed but either it wasn't resolved or my use case is slightly different.

Is there a reason why the terminal app needs network access for manual installations? Or perhaps is there a dependency that's missing? I'd love to use it with WSL.

The bundle file is Microsoft.WindowsTerminal_3001.21.10351.0_neutral_~_8wekyb3d8bbwe.Msixbundle.

[DHowett]

Thanks for asking!
When you install the msixbundle distribution of Terminal, Windows will search for updated versions of its dependencies on the Store. This is not something we have control over.

From your linked thread,

the preinstallation kit seems to be for a different use case and assumes access to the Microsoft store

Sorry if our documentation is bad here. The preinstallation kit is expressly for deploying on machines with either no network access or no access to the Microsoft Store.

It comes with all of Terminal's dependencies (in appx, msix or msixbundle format) and a license file. All of these things can be registered with the Add-AppxProvisionedPackage commandlet from PowerShell as documented in the DISM documentation on preinstallation.

If you are provisioning Terminal for offline use and still seeing network-related errors on startup, can you share the output of...

Get-AppxPackage
Get-AppxProvisionedPackage -Online

Sure enough there's no C:\Program Files\WindowsApps directory.

If you do not have one of these (and you are using Windows 10 or Windows 11, natch), your operating system is probably beyond broken.

If you do have one of these, please do not manipulate its ACLs to gain access to it; the app platform is fragile and will break in mysterious ways if you do this. This is unfortunately also out of our control.

[miles-smiles]

Just got back to this and I got it to work Thanks!!

I'm just discovering the packaging systems used by Microsoft. This page on the various distribution types was very useful. I was able to install and run the v1.22.10352.0 release from here.

These are the two commands that worked for me (in this order):

Add-AppxProvisionedPackage -Online -PackagePath <path-to-Microsoft.UI.Xaml.2.8_8.2501.31001.0_x64__8wekyb3d8bbwe.appx> -LicensePath <path-to- 60e81fd657c844c0ba03687c799996d5_License1.xml>

Add-AppxProvisionedPackage -Online -PackagePath <path-to-60e81fd657c844c0ba03687c799996d5.msixbundle> -LicensePath <path-to- 60e81fd657c844c0ba03687c799996d5_License1.xml>

I'm also able to see them listed in the output of Get-AppxProvisionedPackage -Online

[DHowett]

Ah, that's awesome! I'm glad it worked.

I'd be happy to add any/all of this to our documentation. Any ideas on what was the most helpful note?

[miles-smiles]

Your list of commands and emphasis on the preinstallation kit made me want to connect the dots which led me to the page on the Windows Terminal distribution types which was very informative. But that page doesn't really offer guidance on commands so I extracted the files in the kit to a folder and looked at the options for the Add-AppxProvisionedPackage command (found here). That info was a bit confusing because it didn't mention anything about msixbundle files (which was in the kit). I thought the FolderPath option was made for this situation but that didn't work so I just tried the commands above.

I also restarted the laptop since, apparently, the application registration process makes the application available to the user during a login. Maybe I didn't need to restart but that's what I did.