Runtime And Bootstrap Errors
Common Symptoms
| Symptom | Likely cause | Fix |
|---|
| App starts on dev machine but not clean machine | Runtime installed on dev machine only | Test runtime deployment on clean Windows machine |
| Windows App SDK API fails early | Bootstrapper did not run before SDK API | Initialize bootstrapper at startup for unpackaged/external-location apps |
| Architecture-specific failure | Wrong x64/x86/arm64 runtime package | Install matching runtime or use redistributable correctly |
| Self-contained output still missing behavior | Feature depends on additional package/service | Check self-contained docs and feature-specific dependencies |
| Runtime blocked during update | Package in use or DDLM behavior | Close app and inspect deployment/runtime logs |
Checks
Packaging model:
Runtime model:
Runtime installer used:
Architecture:
Bootstrapper call location:
First Windows App SDK API call:
Event Viewer/runtime log:
Recovery Path
- Confirm packaging model.
- Confirm runtime model.
- Confirm current runtime version from downloads page.
- Confirm bootstrapper or Deployment API path.
- Test on a clean machine.