Value does not fall within the expected range while activating feature in MOSS using stsadm tool

While i tried to implement a custom feature in MOSS, i ended up with the error message "Value does not fall within the expected range".

What has happened is i tried the implementation of feature in wrong sequence, and i received message saying the dependendent feature has to be activated first. Thereafter i activated the other one and then tried this later and got the above message.

The solution use the argument -force. And i beleive that the initial activate attempt haults the process halfway and hence we need to force the activation process.

Here is the full command

ststadm.exe -o activatefeature -filename \feature.xml -url "http://localhost" -force

That s it !

What is MOSS?

MOSS (Microsoft Office SharePoint Server) is a portal-based platform from Microsoft for collaboratively creating, managing and sharing documents and Web services. MOSS enables users to create portals that include shared workspaces, applications, blogs, wikis and other documents accessible through a Web browser. The free version, Windows SharePoint Server (WSS 3.0), lighter version of MOSS, usually referred to as simply SharePoint is available as a free download included with every Windows Server 2003 or higher license