Modify Internet Explorer 8 MUI Pack to install a single language

3 Jan

Today I wanted to install the Dutch Language pack for Internet Explorer 8, the Dutch language comes as part of the Windows Internet Explorer 8 MUI Pack (in my case the version for Windows Server 2003 SP2).

If you install the MUI Pack you will always end up with all 35 (!) languages installed. This behaviour is the same as the language pack for Internet Explorer 7 that I wrote about earlier (see Modifying Microsoft Updates and/or hotfixes)

The solution is really the same as for the IE7 language pack: you modify the inf file (in my case update_srv03.inf) but if you run update.exe it will refuse to use your modified inf file:

So we need to patch update.exe to accept your modified version!

The patcher from my previous article doesn’t work however on the update.exe from this MUI pack because the asm was changed too much for my patcher to recognise it.

So I created a new patch, based on update.exe 6.13.5.0 dated 7-1-2009.

The patcher will change this code:

; __stdcall IsInfFileTrusted(x)
_IsInfFileTrusted@4 proc near

var_3C= dword ptr -3Ch
var_34= dword ptr -34h
var_2C= dword ptr -2Ch
var_24= dword ptr -24h
var_1C= dword ptr -1Ch
var_4= dword ptr -4
arg_0= dword ptr  8

mov     edi, edi
push    ebp
mov     ebp, esp
push    ecx
push    ebx
push    esi
push    edi
push    _g_hInf
call    ds:__imp__UpdSpCloseInfFile@4 ; UpdSpCloseInfFile(x)
mov     eax, _g_hInfForSetupApi
xor     ebx, ebx        ; Logical Exclusive OR
cmp     eax, ebx        ; Compare Two Operands
mov     _g_hInf, ebx
jz      short loc_104DF11 ; Jump if Zero (ZF=1)

; __stdcall IsInfFileTrusted(x)

_IsInfFileTrusted@4 proc near

var_3C= dword ptr -3Ch

var_34= dword ptr -34h

var_2C= dword ptr -2Ch

var_24= dword ptr -24h

var_1C= dword ptr -1Ch

var_4= dword ptr -4

arg_0= dword ptr 8

mov edi, edi

push ebp

mov ebp, esp

push ecx

push ebx

push esi

push edi

push _g_hInf

call ds:__imp__UpdSpCloseInfFile@4 ; UpdSpCloseInfFile(x)

mov eax, _g_hInfForSetupApi

xor ebx, ebx ; Logical Exclusive OR

cmp eax, ebx ; Compare Two Operands

mov _g_hInf, ebx

jz short loc_104DF11 ; Jump if Zero (ZF=1)

; __stdcall IsInfFileTrusted(x)
_IsInfFileTrusted@4 proc near
mov     eax, 1
retn    4
_IsInfFileTrusted@4 endp

; __stdcall IsInfFileTrusted(x)

_IsInfFileTrusted@4 proc near

mov eax, 1

retn 4

_IsInfFileTrusted@4 endp

So now you can install just the languages you need (see the previous article for a howto on editing the inf file).
Enjoy and please leave a comment if you found this usefull!

Microsoft Update.exe Patcher (1445 downloads )

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Filed under: General, Packaging, Unattended Installation, Windows 2008, Windows 2008 R2, Windows 7, Windows XP

4 Responses for "Modify Internet Explorer 8 MUI Pack to install a single language"

Twitted by RemkoWeijnen January 3rd, 2011 at 12:26 1
[…] This post was Twitted by RemkoWeijnen […]
Lukas Pravda January 3rd, 2011 at 14:33 2
Hi,
Nice article.
Could update.exe patching be used to be able to install IE8 within the Citrix Profiler?
(Actually Crytographic service error is where the installation fails.)
Pretty the same problem occurs when you try to install anything else that is a part of OS. (For example the new version of RDP client. Such trivial thing and cannot be isolated!)
–Lukas
Remko January 3rd, 2011 at 14:40 3
Lukas, I cannot test this since I don’t currently use it but I think that patching update.exe will not help you because it’s only used in the update but it’s very likely that IE8 does some kind of self health/signature check that fails because of Isolation. So patching could help here but it would need research to see where the actual error comes from!
PS: often the crypto functions are dependant on the machine key which is in the LocalSystem’s profiledir.
Lukas Pravda January 3rd, 2011 at 16:01 4
I was always wondering what is Crypto Service good for during the installations(!)…
I’ll give patcher a try at least in context of RDP client. (Would be a quick win) and see if it makes any differecne or not. 🙂