There it was again when I ran WinGet upgrade –all this morning: “Installer failed with exit code: 4294967295.” I recognized this as the topic of a blog post I wrote about a year ago (March 11 2024). And sure enough, though it took the better part of 10 minutes to grind through to completion the same fix worked. If you experience the Office Update hiccup return, too, visit Settings > Apps > Apps & features > click on Microsoft 365 Apps (for enterprise in my case, YMMV by version). Then, click Quick Repair for the fix. Done!

Why Does the Office Update Hiccup Return?

You can see what the error looks like in the lead-in screencap, which shows the error message instead of a successful completion. Not to worry,  you’ll get a successful outcome after working through the quick repair scenario described in the preceding paragraph. Then you’ll see something like the following instead:

After Quick Repair, the update suceeds without error.

I can only speculate about WHY this happens, but my best guess is that some auto-update interferes with the file structure of the existing Microsoft 365 Apps install. The error code, as it turns out, it turns out to represent an unmatched exit code that pops up as the Microsoft 365 Apps installer is running. There seems to be an “interesting” interaction with WinGet going on here, because the problem does not occur if you use the built-in Office updater.

If Only I Could Remember My Name

As so often happens, the same errors can pop up from time to time in Windows World. I had to chuckle because my Google search on this error code this morning reminded me of my own blog post a year ago. The nice thing about Windows errors (with tongue planted firmed in cheek) is not only that there are so many from which to choose, but that certain ones do recur occasionally. The problem — for me, anyway — lies in recognizing and remembering them. I hope this blog post helps you avoid the same entanglement.

Here’s an interesting but annoying — and thankfully,  merely temporary — Outlook gotcha. Monday and Tuesday my email productivity was hampered by some bizarre cursor behavior when entering text into the body of a message. Too bad I didn’t shoot a video, but I’ll do my best to explain the experience. During text input the cursor would occasionally freeze without displaying all of what I had just typed. But then, as soon as I hit the proverbial “any” key, all text would output in one go. Repeat ad nauseam. This morning, I decided to check Microsoft 365 (Office) updates. Sure enough, after restarting Outlook this cursor lag is gone. Hence my blog post title: Outlook text input lag comes & goes.

Optimistic Strategy Drives Outlook Text Input Lag Comes & Goes

If you check out my August 2024 ComputerWorld story, you’ll see that running updates could be an early entry in a series of 5 steps to repair Microsoft Office (or Microsoft 365, if you prefer). It reflects a slightly Pollyanna-ish hope that MS might have noticed and fixed whatever’s currently amiss. And indeed, sometimes this strategy actually works. That’s what happened this time, amazingly enough, with my cursor lag problem in Outlook text entry.

Other potential fixes include (try again after each one, to see if it’s worked):

• Close down Office applications or apps, and reboot the PC.
• Run the Quick Repair tool.
• Use the Office Online Repair tool.
• Try Microsoft Support and Recovery Assistant (SaRA) for Office repairs.
• Uninstall, then re-install Office. Be sure to download and use the OffScrub tool as part of this maneuver for maximum clean-up.

In my experience, I’ve only had to go as far as Step 5 in this series a handful of times. With 30-plus years of running Office on Macs and PCs, that’s not too shabby.

All’s Well That Ends Well

I was shocked … shocked, I tell you … when my “Let’s try Update” strategy fixed the cursor lag for text entry in Outlook this morning. But I’m glad to be working closer to my optimum, thanks to the vital importance of Outlook email to my daily routine. Thanks, MS!