#109 Frozen environment and win32com.server.register.RegisterServer()

[Jonathan Besanceney]

Hi,

I'm working on an Excel COM add-in with Python 3.3 / pywin32 v219. Everything works fine, except when I'm trying to cx_Freeze my app to distribute it.

The RegisterServer function doesn't create all requested keys in the windows registery.
You will find below a diff for my HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID{C5482ECA-F559-45A0-B078-B2036E6F011A} key.

Normal environment	Frozen environment	Status
\Debugging	\Debugging	OK
\Implemented Categories	Not created	missing key, but doesn't seem mandatory
\Implemented Categories\{B3EF80D0-68E2-11D0-A689-00C04FD658FF}	Not created	doesn't seem mandatory
\InprocServer32	Not created	seems mandatory
\ProgID	\ProgID	OK
\PythonCOM	\PythonCOM	OK
\PythonCOMDispatcher	\PythonCOMDispatcher	OK (debug mode only)
\PythonCOMPath	Not created	seems mandatory
\PythonCOMPolicy	\PythonCOMPolicy	OK

When I create thoses registry keys by hand, my add-in registers in Excel.
Further researches in the register process shows me that the frozen case is implemented in win32com.server.register.RegisterServer(), but I don't know if cx_Freeze provides all requested env vars.

• For the \InProcServer32 key, the involved RegisterServer() code says (register.py, line 209) :

if pythoncom.frozen:
 if hasattr(sys, "frozendllhandle"):
  dllName = win32api.GetModuleFileName(sys.frozendllhandle) 
 else:
  raise RuntimeError("We appear to have a frozen DLL, but I don't know the DLL to use")

• For the \PythonCOMPath key, it's the RegisterClasses() function (register.py, line 426) which doesn't provide addnPath arg to RegisterServer() :

      # Frozen apps don't need their directory on sys.path
      if not pythoncom.frozen:
        scriptDir = os.path.split(sys.argv[0])[0]
        if not scriptDir: scriptDir = "."
        addnPath = win32api.GetFullPathName(scriptDir)

As I'm a new Python user, maybe I miss something with cx_freeze (need to provide more elements to make pywin32 works in frozen env ?), or maybe cx_freeze is not the best tool to freeze my pywin32 app ?

Hope to read you soon,

Best regards,

Jonathan