There's a new version of Q824704 at the URL below:

Download details: XPE QFE Rollup, Summer 2003

Let me tell you, this one was a bit of a surprise, but looking at it in reverse, it's understandable. Here's the story...

Normally, I author all the QFE's. To do this, I grab versions of the SLD's we use to build our main database, make the modifications, and send them off for testing. This one was a little different - someone else actually made all the changes to the components. Instead of grabbing SLD files used to build the DB, she grabbed the SLD files that were provided by the other MS teams.

For better understanding, you need to know about cooked and uncooked components. When a feature team gives us a SLD file, it has the files, registry keys, and FBA resources already in it, and maybe some file dependencies. We put those SLD files through a process we call cooking, which (among other things) resolves all the file dependencies into component dependencies. Those cooked components are what we bring together to build the XPE database, and what I use to build QFE's.

Since uncooked components were used to make this particular QFE, the fact that some of those components had been QFE'd previously was missed. When we test, we test the QFE alone to make sure it doesn't screw anything up - if we tried to test every combination of QFE's together, we'd never ship anything. So, when the QFE was ready to ship, it was already conflicting with existing QFE's (Q328310 and Q814078). By conflict, I mean we had two different components with the same revision number, but different GUID's and resources. Whatever got added last won, which meant you'd be missing part of a QFE somewhere - definitely bad ju-ju.

Anyway, to fix it, I took the previously QFE'd components from Q328310 and Q814078, made the changes that were needed from Q824704, bumped the revision, and sent it off for retest and publishing. We're in the middle of implementing a new QFE process that should eliminate this problem, using components in a master XPE database as source for QFE authoring and testing. This one just fell through the cracks. On the bright side, it's the first and only screw-up of it's kind we've had, and the post-mortem on the issue was done before I could get the component re-authored and off to test.

And that's what we like to call a small part of QFE Hell (TM).