I am working on a converted VS2005 project and getting random crashes of the VS2008 IDE. Mostly when it is trying to open a source file or designer file, but it also happens for no appearant reason.It happens to frequently to allow me to effectively workon the project, but all I get is the dialogue that sends information to microsoft, giving me no clue what is wrong or what happened.

How can I find out why VS2008 crashes, so I may be able to sort it out and start using the tool.

Yeah, most of the time it is :-(

In VS2005 however, the project did not give any problems, and I use try/catch consistently.

Also, ... even if I forgot this construct at a crucial place, the exceptionwould bubble up - shouldn't it. And the IDE could catch it then - right? (well it seems not)

Your answer, however, trigggered a thought. I am using Infragistic components and I know from past experience that upgrading/moving projects alway gives problems with the license files. After fiddling a bit around with emptying cache directories, re-registering the components and using Infragistics upgrade tool (although I was not upgrading the components) my forms seems to behave much better now!!!

Almost no crashes after that :-)

There's not been a lot of response to my initial question ...

The crashes seems mostlyto appear when I open a form in the designer for the first time.

Subsequently opening a form after an initial crash isalmost never causing a crashafter that ...

This indicates there's maybe something in the "converted" files that's not behaving as it should be.

Martin -

I'm going to redirect you to the Windows Forms forum in the hopes that someone there may be able to help with your issue.

Hi Jeffrey,

The blog you point me to offers interesting stuff, however, it requires skills I do not (yet) have. Besides, I do not think I have the insight knowledge of how VS2008 is supposed to work. Clearly VS2008 is crashing for some reason, and I had hoped it's developpers would keep a log somewhere which could give me a hint of why it is crashing.

I do not want to test and debug VS2006 (a high quality, fully released and supported Microsoft product) , I want to use it to develop my own applications. And while doing that the tool is crashing and making it almost impossible to use it.

Martin

Though not impossible, it is not likely that you will find a magic bullet here. I do understand your position, believe me, however I have to point out that the software engineering gravy train left the station 25 years ago. Actually, it was never parked in the first place, the one's that keep popping up turn out to be illusions.

The fact is, you have a problem and you'll have to deal with it. While the tool may be the source of the problem, you cannot know that until you determine what the problem is.

The first thing I would check is your system. Have you removed all beta installations of .NET and Visual Studio? Have you tried this on another (preferably pristine) development machine?

Next I would start removing items from the project one at a time until you can isolate a single (or a few) items. If it's a particular form causing problems, try removing controls one at a time.

Once you have it in the simplest reproducable form you could visit Microsoft Connect and submit the project along with a report.

I appreciate your answer (realy). My first computer was a Tandy TRS-80 to give you a feel ofwhere I am coming from. I have not installed any betas. Your next suggestion (removing the parts bit-by-bit) until you hit the culpritt is time consuming (I now from experience), and usually my last resort.

I was not looking for a magic bullet, but rather a hint of where i might find a bit of info a why the IDE crashed. (there's not even a run-time error!) That would make the removal of the bitsmuch more effecient.

ThanX

Martin

I had crashing problems with the last beta of VS2008, but the RTM release arrived shortly after I had installed it. I wiped my machine clean for the RTM install. I have had no problems with crashing so far. That's why I suggested you try the same project on a 'pristine' machine and see if it makes a difference. Did you try that?

Ive had a fair few Forms and controls crash my IDE - and its always been my code thats done it!

The VS IDE runs your code when you show the designer, and you may have made certain assumptions in your code that say things like, this file will be here (maybe it gets copied on build), that registry key will be there, and so on. If these cases arent true, and your code doesnt protect against failure too well (ie a try-catch block), you can get an exception that might bubble all the way to the top of the exception stack and crash the IDE. Try looking for code in your form constructor, or Form load events. Try either sticking a try-catch block around, or checking if you are in design mode (a property of the form/control).

Try closing all open tabs in VS and opening each form one at a time, to see which one(s) actually are crashing the IDE. The start checking and double checking your code to make sure its a solid as possible. Make sure no error goes unchecked and then double check again.

It does suck that the IDE crashes under these sorts of conditions (why cant VS handle the errors more gracefully?), but ultimately its usually (y)our code thats failing and simply taking VS with it...........

A good way to find out exactly which line of your code is causing the problem (assuming it is your code of course), is to

1: Open Visual Studio

2: Open Visual Studio (another one)

3: Using the 1st Visual Studio - go to Tools->Attach ToProcess, select devenv.exe

4: In the 2nd Visual Studio open your project. Then do whatever you do to make it crash.

When it crashes the 1st Visual Studio should pick it up and can usually show you the exact line that caused it to error. And if its in your code, thats even better, because you can fix it and not have to wait for MS

Neil

Yes I did, and itshows more or less the same sort of problems.

Yeah, most of the time it is :-(

In VS2005 however, the project did not give any problems, and I use try/catch consistently.

Also, ... even if I forgot this construct at a crucial place, the exceptionwould bubble up - shouldn't it. And the IDE could catch it then - right? (well it seems not)

Your answer, however, trigggered a thought. I am using Infragistic components and I know from past experience that upgrading/moving projects alway gives problems with the license files. After fiddling a bit around with emptying cache directories, re-registering the components and using Infragistics upgrade tool (although I was not upgrading the components) my forms seems to behave much better now!!!

Almost no crashes after that :-)