An error occurred while signing: SignTool.exe not found.

Ever get either of these two errors while trying to deploy a .Net app?  Specifically, while trying to publish a Click-Once deployed app (it can happen in other cases too)?

I’ve got a freshly built PC with Visual Studio 2013 installed and one of the first apps I created was a simple WinForms app with Click-Once deployment and I got this error.

After much frustrated Googling, I found no answers, so I figured this one out myself.

Here’s why this error happens

[GARD]

The signtool.exe file is actually missing.  But, that doesn’t mean you don’t have it on your PC.  There are multiple SDK versions likely installed on your machine, but the signtool.exe isn’t in all of them and where ever Visual Studio is looking for it is NOT one of the locations that has it.

Solution

I searched my hard drive for signtool.exe and found it here:

C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v7.1A\Bin

Then I noticed that in C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft SDKs\Windows

there were multiple version folders.  I placed a copy of signtool.exe in each one of them inside their bin folder.  If they didn’t have a bin folder, I created one.

Turns out, the v7.0A\bin folder is where it needed to be (at least, on MY machine).  After placing a copy of signtool.exe there, it solved the problem.

[GARD]

 

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