Gen Toolset "Unable to create a unique work directory ..."

Products

Gen Gen - Workstation Toolset Gen - Host Encyclopedia Gen - Run Time Distributed

Issue/Introduction

When trying to open the Gen 8.6 Toolset all too often developers are presented with the Confirmation message box:
Unable to create a unique work directory C:\Program Files (x86)\CA\Gen86\Gen\wknnnnnn\. You may wish to check manually before Retry. A Cancel here will EXIT CA Gen.

The cause of the problem seems to be that the Toolset ief6900.dat file has had its Output and Work directory paths reset to be empty without the user changing the Toolset Options/Paths.
While this is simple enough to work around by deleting the %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\CA\Gen 8.6\cfg\Toolset\ief6900.dat" file or starting the Toolset with "Run as administrator" it is very annoying.

Environment

Release : 8.6

Component : Gen Workstation Toolset

Resolution

A more user-friendly workaround is as follows:

Take a "good" copy of a working ief6900.dat file e.g. ief6900_good.dat.
Edit the "%Gen86%\Gen\toolset.bat" file to delete the current ief6900.dat file and copy in the ief6900_good.dat file before every TOOLSET.EXE start e.g.

DEFAULT:
+++
@echo off
REM This batch file uses the batch file included in the MSVS .NET to setup the necessary environment variable before starting Toolset.exe.
setlocal
if exist "%VS140COMNTOOLS%vsvars32.bat" call "%VS140COMNTOOLS%\vsvars32.bat"
start "" "%GEN86%gen\TOOLSET.EXE"
endlocal
+++

WITH CHANGES:
+++
@echo off
REM This batch file uses the batch file included in the MSVS .NET to setup the necessary environment variable before starting Toolset.exe.
setlocal
if exist "%VS140COMNTOOLS%vsvars32.bat" call "%VS140COMNTOOLS%\vsvars32.bat"
del "%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\CA\Gen 8.6\cfg\Toolset\ief6900.dat"
copy "%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\CA\Gen 8.6\cfg\Toolset\ief6900_good.dat" "%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\CA\Gen 8.6\cfg\Toolset\ief6900.dat"
start "" "%GEN86%gen\TOOLSET.EXE"
endlocal
+++
(The ief6900_good.dat can of course be kept in any directory)

The above of course assumes the user will not need to change the Paths after initially doing so to create the initial ief6900.dat (then copied to ief6900_good.dat). If they do then they will need to make a new version of the ief6900_good.dat from the updated ief6900.dat.

Additional Information

After further investigation Gen Engineering were not able to recreate the problem causing the Output and Work directory paths to be reset to empty in the ief6900.dat file.

Gen Toolset ief6900.dat file stores Toolset Paths & Generation Defaults

Gen™ 8.6 > Reference > Messages > Toolset Messages > Unable to create a unique work directory variable. You may wish to check manually before Retry. A Cancel here will EXIT Gen.

Gen™ 8.6 > Reference > Messages > Toolset Messages > Work directory is invalid. Using current directory.