WebClient project... can't compile!

Luc Pattyn

Hi, 1. both 3.0 and 3.5 are extensions to 2.0; they don't replace files, they just add functionality (such as WCF, WPF, and what have you) by adding files. 2. .NET sizes will vary due to: - installation options (such as MSDN, Web Services, etc) - service packs and fixes. I don't expect it makes much sense to worry about those sizes. And I don't currently have 3.0 and 3.5 on my XP machine. 3. all .NET versions and all Visual Studio versions (with different year numbers that is), can live next to each other. The only influence they have on each other, is that the last one you install steals the file extensions, so double-clicking a .cs or a .sln file will probably open up the Visual Studio version you installed last. :)

Luc Pattyn [Forum Guidelines] [My Articles]

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Sonrisante

OK, I promise this will be my last posting, but I found what might be another hint. When typing in the editor, the autocomplete only lists two items under System.Net. - IPEndPointCollection (interface) - PeerToPeer (class) So, my suspicion is that it's only seeing the 3.5 additions, and not getting back to the core framework. I'm not sure how to fix this, if it is the case; nor do I know how to tell whether that's the case. (I found and looked at the System.Net.xml file and see that only these items are listed.) If this sheds any light for anyone, I'd once again appreciate the help. My next step, if it must come to it, would be to (with much trepidation) uninstall all .NET framework versions and then install 3.5, hoping it will install the previous versions, and all will be happy in XP land again. (My concern in doing this is a fear of breaking other things that have been working, such as Office or other application software.) Thanks again, Bob Smiley Pleasanton, CA

Luc Pattyn

Sonrisante wrote:

I promise this will be my last posting

No need. As long as one adds interesting stuff to a thread, I don't mind.

Sonrisante wrote:

the autocomplete only lists two items

Sonrisante wrote:

my suspicion is that it's only seeing the 3.5 additions

That observation seems correct, although I don't understand what would cause it.

Sonrisante wrote:

uninstall all .NET framework versions and then install 3.5

Aha, I just discovered my Vista only shows 1.1 and 3.5 under Control Panel/Programs and Features. I'm pretty sure XP would show 1.x, 2.0, and whatever else got installed. If you remove, I recommend reverse order (3.5 first). I expect removing .NET will break Visual Studio, but not most other apps; things like Office don't rely on .NET at all AFAIK. Please keep posting your progress on this. It is bound to interest other people too. :)

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Sonrisante

Thanks Luc. With encouragement like that, I will definitely keep the updates coming. I've already uninstalled and reinstalled .NET 3.5 with no improvement. So my next step will be to uninstall the full .NET framework, in reverse version order as you suggest. Actually, before I do that, I'll probably do some other clean-up, such as removing C# 2005 Express that I've had on there, and old SQL Server versions as well. If I'm going to clean up, I might as well clean up! But I'll check in between the steps to see if any one thing happens to "correct" it before doing the full-scale .NET framework reinstall. For documentation purposes, I'll list what I have showing up in my Add/Remove Programs for my computer (XP Media Center edition 2005):

Microsoft .NET Compact Framework 2.0 SP2
Microsoft .NET Compact Framework 3.5
Microsoft .NET Framework 1.0 Hotfix (KB887998)
Microsoft .NET Framework 1.0 Hotfix (KB930494)
Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1
Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1 Hotfix (KB928366)
Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 Service Pack 1
- .NET Framework CLR
- .NET Framework 2
- .NET Framework PreXP
- .NET Framework WinForms
- .NET Framework 1
- Dr. Watson
- .NET Framework CRT
- .NET Framework CA
- .NET Framework ASP .NET
Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 Service Pack 1
- NET Framework WPF 2
- NET Framework WPF 3
- NET Framework WPF 1
- .NET Framework WF x86
- NET Framework WPF 3 x86
- .NET Framework XPS
- .NET Framework WF
- NET Framework WPF 2 x86
- .NET Framework WCS
- .NET Framework WCF
Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5

Of course, there are also many items listed for Visual Studio and related tools, but these are what I have listed for the Framework.

Luc Pattyn

Wow, quite a list. I am guessing you run XP then. I am not familiar with the Compact Framework nor its tools. I think I would suggest to remove all Visual Studios (unless 6.0 and older) first, then roll back on .NET (VS2008 needs 3.5, VS2005 needs 2.0 or better, VS2003 needs 1.1). The .NET versions you are likely to need are 1.1 (for old managed stuff) and 3.5 There probably is no need to have 1.0 anymore, and 2.0 and 3.0 don't make sense if you have 3.5 All that for the non-compact, I really don't know how the CF versions go. Good luck!

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Sonrisante

Status report so far:

Uninstalled all prior versions of Visual Studio: this didn't make the problem go away, but it didn't make anything worse, and now I have a faster computer.
Uninstalled all versions of .NET Framework (non-compact).
Reinstalled .NET Framework 3.5: still didn't fix the problem. But Frameworks #1.0, 2.0 SP1, 3.0 SP1, and 3.5 all show up again in the Add/Remove programs list, so at least it thinks that all versions were installed.

I've now gone back to the Microsoft Website and downloaded the "full redistributable" version (197MB) to see if that will make any difference. Apparently I was using a "bootstrapped" version before. I wouldn't expect this to make any difference, but what have I got to lose? If this doesn't work, then I'll uninstall all Visual Studio and related applications, and reinstall the whole kit and kaboodle.

Sonrisante

Neither the "full distribution" nor uninstalling all legacy visual studio components and then reinstalling only VS2008 worked, although now I have more disk space! I did find this MSDN thread that at first glance I thought was describing my problem, but it turns out it was a red herring. Even so, I've posted my plight in that thread to see if any help will be forthcoming from there, which I will then repost here. http://forums.msdn.microsoft.com/en-US/vssetup/thread/a3da6655-0fa6-47f9-adb8-ff8943a24d48/[^]

Sonrisante

Luc: The more I thought of it, the more it came back to something incorrect on my side, from a programmer's standpoint, not a setup standpoint. And indeed that was the issue. I had added a reference for System.Net when I really only needed a reference to System. I'm not sure how I could have found that out... the differences between namespaces and references are still mysterious to me, and I don't exactly know why the namespace doesn't include, if not infer, the required references (or vice versa). In case you're interested, here's how I figured it out. I actually booted up an old PC from 2 years ago that I just hadn't gotten around to trashing yet; it had an old VS on it (prior to 2003). I created the project, and when trying to add the reference to System.Net it would not allow me to. So I didn't. I compiled it, and it compiled and ran perfectly! So, I copied that very project to my new machine, which "upgraded" it to the current version, and it ran perfectly as well. When I checked the references, it had System but not System.Net listed. Does this sound like it might be what you ran across that time when you found the same issue but it just sort of disappeared on its own? Thanks for watching this thread; your feedback helped me get to discovering my misunderstanding, and a cleaner hard disk as a bonus! :-D 7/23/2008: edited to clarify that I was referring to "References" which I mistakenly called "Registrations", as pointed out in Luc's reply to this message.

Luc Pattyn

Hi, preliminary remark: you really should add this as a reply to one of my messages if you want to make sure I get notified and read it; answering to your own messages only notifies you. But I noticed it anyhow! I am not sure what you mean by registering. In order to use a namespace you: - must make sure it will be found by the compiler, so it can check the types; that is what you do by "adding a reference"; - may want to add a "using" (C#) or "imports" (VB.NET) statement, which allows you to shorten the class identification, as long as it remains unambiguous. So in conclusion it seems you solved it, but I do not understand what was causing the problem you had. :)

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Sonrisante

Thanks for the note about replies; I had thought that any new entry in the thread would notify you. What I meant by "registering" was really "adding a reference". Thanks for clarifying, wording is very important in these things. I had the using System; and using System.Net; statements in the code, because it was copied from the sample I took from MSDN. I don't remember exactly why, but for some reason I thought I needed to add a reference to System.Net to use this functionality. So I did. In VS2008, I can do this, and it results in the problem I found. This is probably because the System.Net.xml file exists and, by adding a reference to it, the core System.Net gets overshadowed. (Makes me wonder why they allow me to add a reference to it in the first place.) When I went to my old machine, which had an earlier version of VS and .NET 2.0 framework, I could not add the reference to System.Net, presumably because the System.Net.xml file didn't exist in that version of the framework. What I don't remember is whether I tried to compile my initial project, and some failure caused me to decide to add the reference. It's likely that I just outsmarted myself in thinking that networking components would be something that had to be "linked in" instead of available by default. Regards, Bob Smiley Pleasanton, CA

Kevin McFarlane

Sonrisante wrote:

I don't exactly know why the namespace doesn't include, if not infer, the required references (or vice versa).

Apparently Eclipse does this kind of thing with Java. It would be a good thing to have in VS. They've got half of it. If you already have a reference but not a using statement then clicking on the class and typing Alt+Shift+F10 auto-includes the using statement or the fully qualified class name.

Kevin