wxWidgets Discussion Forum

Okay, I sincerely apologize if this is in the wrong place but I honestly have no idea what I'm doing here. I have had very little exposure to programming.

I downloaded and installed the wxMSW package as well as Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 express.

I double clicked to open the file wx_dll.dsw and it opened in Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Express Edition.

I get a pop up that says "The project 'wx_adv.dsp' must be converted to the current Visual C++ project format. After it has been converted, you will not be able to edit this project in previous versions of Visual Studio. Convert and open this project?" My options are Yes, No, Yes To All, and No To All

I click "Yes To All" and get an error saying "The operation could not be completed" my only option is to hit "ok".

I then receive the following message: "The project file 'C:\wxWidgets-2.8.12\build\msw\wx_adv.dsp' cannot be loaded. Do you want to remove the unloadable project from the solution?" I proceed to hit "yes" at each prompt.

What should I do?

Are you sure you downloaded the wxMSW package and not wxALL? Usually you get this kind of error if you download wxALL which contains unix lineendings (which VS doesn't like).

Alternatively, try wx 2.9.3 which contains projects files specifically for VS2008 (and others).

I just double-checked to see and yes it was the wxMSW package that I downloaded and installed, not wxALL.

The guide I'm reading said I need 2.9.12. I suppose I could try 2.9.3 as well though.

The guide I'm reading said I need 2.9.12. I suppose I could try 2.9.3 as well though.

I guess you mean 2.8.12 here. If you're trying to build another application that requires 2.8.12 and is not tested on 2.9.x, it might not work out of the box. Then maybe you should try to get 2.8.12 to work.

However, i just tested with 2.8.12 and VS2008 express and it built out of the box, so i have no idea what's wrong on your side. Maybe try VS2010 express although it shouldn't make any difference.

Yes I assume getting 2.8.12 to work would be ideal, but it's failed every time I've tried it.

I downloaded wxMSW-2.8.12.zip and extracted it with folder structure preserved (into a local folder with no spaces in its name). I then opened wx_dll.dsw and chose "Yes To All" when asked if convert and open the project. Worked flawlessly (including the build process), so it appears the issue is not with wxWidgets. Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Express Edition, Version 9.0.30729.1 SP on Windows XP SP3.

Can you open wx.dsw, samples.dsw or e.g. the individual sample DSWs in their respective folders? Can you properly open and compile wxWidgets' DSP projects? Is your Visual Studio properly installed, i.e. can you open and compile other projects, assuming you have any? I would also downloaded wxWidgets 2.9.3 and tried to open both *.dsw and *.sln files there to see if it works or not.

Also this is a long shot, but are you not opening those projects by Visual C# by an accident?

Alright so I tried to just open a blank project in visual studio and kept getting an error, which I posted a question about in the support forums for visual studio.

For some reason, even though I have the Express edition of visual studio, which does not support add-ins, I keep getting an error that an add-in has caused an access violation. So I go to turn off add-ins, but of course there are none to turn off because Express doesn't support them.

This has turned in to an overly complicated mess.

Did you maybe have another VS version installed on your system in the past?

Do you have the chance to test on a clean system, maybe in a VM?

If I had had a previous install of VS, what could I do about it?

Kingrazor wrote:If I had had a previous install of VS, what could I do about it?

Try to remove all traces, e.g. environment variables that could interfere with the new installation.

Well, I uninstalled the program and dug through my computer looking for every related file and deleted all of them and then reinstalled. Still getting the error.

This is really frustrating.

Would it be possible to compile wxWidgets with Codeblocks?

You can easily compile wxWidgets with VC++ just using a provided makefile but I suppose one would want to use an IDE for his actual project. I think it would be better to make your VC++ IDE work. Have you tried to uninstall/clean/reinstall also VC2008 Express? After uninstalling VC++, have you manually removed everything from following keys (this is for VS 2005 change a version according to the one you had)
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0

And for MSVCE2008:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VCExpress\9.0,
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VCExpress\9.0,
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0


Of course if you're feeling adventurous, you might skip the uninstall VCE2008 phase and try to locate and remove the faulty plugin from its registry settings This might also be of use.

PB wrote:You can easily compile wxWidgets with VC++ just using a provided makefile but I suppose one would want to use an IDE for his actual project. I think it would be better to make your VC++ IDE work. Have you tried to uninstall/clean/reinstall also VC2008 Express? After uninstalling VC++, have you manually removed everything from following keys (this is for VS 2005 change a version according to the one you had)
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0

And for MSVCE2008:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VCExpress\9.0,
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VCExpress\9.0,
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0


Of course if you're feeling adventurous, you might skip the uninstall VCE2008 phase and try to locate and remove the faulty plugin from its registry settings This might also be of use.

Thanks for showing me where to look. I'm not uncomfortable with changing my registry so long as I know where to look.

However, even after doing that and doing a clean install it's not working.

After multiple failed attempts at building wxWidgets I tried to simply open a new project and even that failed. Every time I try it says "Error in loading DLL." Then it says "Add-in '%s' has caused an access violation. Remove it from the Add-in Manager?" With the option to hit "ok".

I made a post on the MSDN support forum about it, but so far haven't managed to find a solution.

I assume you have deleted whole registry trees I listed above after uninstalling VCE, but did you also delete whole \Documents\Visual Studio 2008 or other related folders? It seems VC keeps some of its settings there (in Settings folder).