Oracle Client install fails with NullPointerException

Today I was asked to assist in troubleshooting an Oracle Client (10g) installation. The installation halted very quickly with a java.lang.NullPointerException:

 

The install window shows the Exception:

Arg:13:oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicInstaller:
 Arg:14:-scratchPath:
 Arg:15:"C:\DOCUME~1\!RWEIJ~1\LOCALS~1\Temp\OraInstall2011-09-06_03-32-16PM" :
 Arg:16:-sourceLoc:
 Arg:17:"c:\temp\oracle\source\client\install\../stage/products.xml" :
 Arg:18:-sourceType:
 Arg:19:network:
 Arg:20:-timestamp:
 Arg:21:2011-09-06_03-32-16PM:
 Arg:22:-WAITFORCOMPLETION -debug -nowait -silent -responsefile "c:\temp\Oracle\
Source\client\response\response.rsp":
 -------------------------------------------------------
 Initializing Java Virtual Machine from "C:\DOCUME~1\!RWEIJ~1\LOCALS~1\Temp\OraI
nstall2011-09-06_03-32-16PM\jre\1.4.2\bin\java.exe" . Please wait...

 exception in set dafaults -- setup app properties
Exception java.lang.NullPointerException occurred..
java.lang.NullPointerException
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicBaseApp.initBooleanDefaults(OiicBaseApp.ja
va:452)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicBaseApp.setDefaults(OiicBaseApp.java:442)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicBaseApp.processCmdLine(OiicBaseApp.java:281)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicInstaller.processCommandLine(OiicInstaller.java:652)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicInstaller.runInstaller(OiicInstaller.java:893)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicInstaller.main(OiicInstaller.java:872)
Exception in thread "main" java.lang.ExceptionInInitializerError
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicInstaller.runInstaller(OiicInstaller.java:990)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicInstaller.main(OiicInstaller.java:872)
Caused by: java.lang.NullPointerException
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiif.oiifm.OiifmMainFrame.addWizardDialog(OiifmMainFrame.java:358)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiif.oiifw.OiifwWizDialog.(OiifwWizDialog.java:525)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiif.oiifw.OiifwWizDialog.(OiifwWizDialog.java:550)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiif.oiifm.OiifmGraphicInterfaceManager.(OiifmGraphicInterfaceManager.java:263)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicSessionInterfaceManager.createInterfaceManager(OiicSessionInterfaceManager.java:194)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiic.OiicSessionInterfaceManager.getInterfaceManager(OiicSessionInterfaceManager.java:203)
        at oracle.sysman.oii.oiif.oiifm.OiifmAlert.(OiifmAlert.java:151)

        ... 2 more

I looked at the setup log (default directory is SYSTEM_DRIVE:\Program Files\Oracle\Inventory\logs) but this didn’t show any relevant info.

I also tried adding the –debug switch to the install but again no root cause info.

I turns out that this failure is caused when you run the installation with a username that contains an exclamation mark (!).

In my case there is a company policy that administrative accounts start with an exclamation mark (eg !rweijnen).