Description

When a customer tries to upgrade the User Governance from 10.7 HF2 to 11.1.1 GA, installer gets hanged forever unless we manually abort the installation. In the Installer logs, this sort of error message gets logged.

ERROR 2016-12-30 10:00:09 CodePlex.SharePointInstaller.InstallProcessControl  TimerEventInstall ADSO\sp_install - Error System.FormatException: The input is not a valid Base-64 string as it contains a non-base 64 character, more than two padding characters, or an illegal character among the padding characters.
   at System.Convert.FromBase64_ComputeResultLength(Char* inputPtr, Int32 inputLength)
   at System.Convert.FromBase64CharPtr(Char* inputPtr, Int32 inputLength)
   at System.Convert.FromBase64String(String s)
   at CodePlex.SharePointInstaller.EncryptEngine.Decrypt(String cipherString, Boolean useHashing) in c:\CI Build\Products\Central\Code\Winshuttle.Central.Upgrade\EncryptDecryptData.cs:line 63
   at CodePlex.SharePointInstaller.InstallProcessControl.UpdateDbInstaller.<>c__DisplayClass3.<Execute>b__2() in c:\CI Build\Products\Central\Code\SharepointInstaller\Development\Source\InstallProcessControl.cs:line 1874
   at Microsoft.SharePoint.Utilities.SecurityContext.RunAsProcess(CodeToRunElevated secureCode)
   at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges(WaitCallback secureCode, Object param)
   at Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSecurity.RunWithElevatedPrivileges(CodeToRunElevated secureCode)
   at CodePlex.SharePointInstaller.InstallProcessControl.UpdateDbInstaller.Execute() in c:\CI Build\Products\Central\Code\SharepointInstaller\Development\Source\InstallProcessControl.cs:line 1879
   at CodePlex.SharePointInstaller.InstallProcessControl.TimerEventInstall(Object myObject, EventArgs myEventArgs) in c:\CI Build\Products\Central\Code\SharepointInstaller\Development\Source\InstallProcessControl.cs:line 114

Applies to

User Governance 10.x, 11x

Cause

 There might be an issue with the SharePoint Timer service, due to which sometimes installers gets hangs for long time.

Solution

To avoid this kind of the issues, SharePoint Configuration cache must be cleared. Please find the link below, where you can find all the steps in detailed from Microsoft about - how to clear the SharePoint Configuration Cache.
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/jamesway/2011/05/23/sharepoint-2010-clearing-the-configuration-cache/