Problem with installing AF Utilities - hash issue

[kowisoft]

Dear KNIMErs,

I tried to download the AF Utilities extension by @AnotherFraudUser because I somehow need to be able to write to Excel macro files (xlsm), as described also in this post:

Can Excel Cell Updater not write to xlsm files?

Hello everyone, I have a KNIME workflow that should take some data and update a specific cell in an Excel Macro file (xlsm). However, whenever I want to do this, I get a very strange error message, see screenshot [image] I researched a bit and found out that in the past (2 years back) KNIME was not capable of using the Excel Cell Updater to write to XLSM files. Is that still the case? Thank you very much in advance.

So I searched the forums and found that AF mentions his extension can do this (and I know it has a lot of other very useful tools) hence I wanted to install it. But I do get this very strange message, that says something about the SHA-256 hash is not as expected, see screenshot.

The interesting part, that in the version I try to install this in (5.4.4) it throws me this error. If I download the self-running zip of version 5.9.0 from the download page at knime.com I can install it without problems.

I wonder if someone has ever encountered a similar problem?

Thank you in advance.

[MartinDDDD]

Hi Philipp,

I am not 100% certain, but from the Extension Dev workshop I attended back in May I recall that there were some changes to the Java Extension API and quite some devs of community extensions were around to get their extensions up and running. I think the API changes came into effect with 5.5.

When you download into 5.4.4, what version of the extension are you installing? >5.5 ?

If so that may be the reason…

[kowisoft]

Thanks a lot for your advice Martin,

I unfortunately cannot tell the version, because it seems to be the same one (from a versioning number) that is installed in both 5.4.4 and 5.9.0 → this is a strong indicator, that your descriptions matches exactly what is happening here.

This leads me to the question: is there a way to download an older version for 5.4.4 eventually somehwere?

[MartinDDDD]

I think if you go to KNIME => Help => About KNIME Analytics platform => Installation details you should see version information for every extension that is installed:

I think to install older versions you have to point to the “older” update sites - found a thread that seems to reference 5.4 update sites:

KNIME Update sites for 5.4 Changed?

. Our users, support team and I are getting notices that our update sites are not correct. No repository found at https://update.knime.com/analytics-platform/5.4. https://update.knime.com/partner/5.4 update.knime.com/community-contributions/trusted/5.4 https://update.knime.com/community-contributions/trusted/5.4 It seems as if the URLS have changed - would anyone know what they have changed to?

Change under Preferences => Install/Update = Available Software Sites:

[kowisoft]

Thanks again.

Unfortunately that does not really lead anywhere as the installed version is in 5.9.0 and from there not backwards compatible.

I have all the standard sites for my version activated, so it should point to the right update sites.

[AnotherFraudUser]

Hi @kowisoft,

not sure if I 100% understand the issue
with my 5.4.5 installation

it nicely installed the correct version with a fresh install

Also double check and all the Jenkins builds seem to point to the correct branches (5.3, 5.4, 5.5 and also 5.9).
So not sure if this is related to MartinDDDD mentioned API change between 5.4/5.5…at least looks good to me

Update sites my 5.4 KNIME used:

So not sure if there is a specific issue with 5.4.4…
If 5.9 is not an option, maybe updating your version to 5.4.5 will resolve the issue?

Currently on the way on vacation - so hopefully that at least helps a bit

[kowisoft]

enjoy your vacation - and don’t worry, one way or the other, I am going to make this work

[MartinDDDD]

This was just an initial thought - I am not 100% across what changed on the Java side as I only develop in Python so I may be entirely wrong with the suspicion.

In one of my projects I am working with 5.4.2 and your extension works like a charm (and makes life so much easier…)

Enjoy your vacation!

[kowisoft]

just tried it again and everything works well until the installation process itself. So I can find it in the ‘Install dialogue’ and also click finish there, all without any problems.

Only when it does the install itself, it returns that strange “Hash error”

In general, I still do find it strange that KNIME still does not allow to update (Excel Cell Updater) Excel macro files. I would not consider this a very exotic use case, especially when you see how much KNIME has focused on finance workflows lately. In my finance experience, xlsm files are basically everyhwere (they are usually what people have used before they learned that KNIME exists).