I have a TCP/CLIENT game server project in Visual Studio 2010. When I start the project in debug mode, some time later (sometimes 1 day, sometimes 1 week) Visual Studio quits debugging without any exceptions or errors. I checked the windows and application log and there is nothing unexpected there.
How can I find out what the real problem is or what (e.g. some exceptions like stackoverflow) can cause the Visual Studio exit debugging?
I assume that your application is multithreaded. In that case uncaught exception in a background thread will crash your application. It will stop your debugger as well since it can't debug all threads at a time and should be manually swiched to a specific thread using Threads window. So the solution is to catch the exceptions in async handlers and at least log them.
This worked for me (for a similar problem - not exactly this); try to reset Visual Studio environment:
devenv.exe /ResetSettings
If you are running something as server in IIS, you can try to disable health monitoring for your server project. So open IIS and right click the application pool. Find the Ping enabled setting, it's under advanced settings and set it to False. An other option is to increase the maximum response time. This is a better solution I think. Set it to about 600 seconds.
If you are debugging for a week, use intellitrace.
You can use this youtube video about intellitrace in Visual Studio 2010 as reference.
Related
When debugging I get the following error:
Unable to step. The operation could not be completed. A retry should
be performed
After clicking OK, the dialog returns:
The debugger cannot continue running the process. The operation could
not be completed. A retry should be performed.
The solution is set to "Debug" and "Any CPU". After restarting the application I can step through the code but it takes 5-10 seconds to step on something that normally goes instant. However CPU, RAM and HDD is operating normally and not peaking. Has anyone else experienced this?
I've also ran into this issue before in Visual Studio 2015 Update 3 on Windows 7 SP1 (64-bit).
Try disabling the Visual Studio hosting process.
Project Properties > Debug > uncheck "Enable the Visual Studio hosting process"
Also, are you running out of memory?
Are you debugging an ASP.NET website?
A known issue with the Visual Studio debugger causing this problem.
There is a race condition that happens when all of the following are
true:
Script debugging is enabled in IE
User is debugging IE and another process
The other process stops (hits breakpoint, step operation completes, stops at an exception, etc) at a moment when IE is not running script
code
IE starts running script code at roughly the same moment that the user hits F10/F5 in Visual Studio. The most likely reason for this to
happen is that the code from ‘setTimeout’ is run – there could be
other reasons as well.
Workaround
If you hit this problem, you can try detaching and reattaching the debugger.
-or-
This problem happens when debugging ASP.NET and when script debugging is enabled in IE. If you disable script debugging in IE, or
toggle it on and off when switching between debugger server-side and
client-side problems, you would be able to work around the issue.
-or-
If your web application is using setTimeout, you may be able to avoid or at least reduce the problem by doing something to ensure that
script runs less often. This could mean increasing the timeout value,
or this could mean adding conditions around when setTimeout is used.
Sources:
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/rakkimk/2008/06/07/getting-unable-to-step-the-operation-could-not-be-completed-a-retry-should-be-performed-while-debugging-in-visual-studio/
https://blogs.iis.net/rakkimk/getting-quot-unable-to-step-the-operation-could-not-be-completed-a-retry-should-be-performed-quot-while-debugging-in-visual-studio
https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/vstudio/en-US/2320a943-d52d-437a-abec-6f1e9f929b52/debugger-error-unable-to-step-the-operation-could-not-be-completed?forum=vsdebug
Are you debugging a Universal Windows App?
If so, a work-around could be to reinstall "Tools for Universal Windows Appps Development" as follows:
· If the “Tools for Universal Windows Apps Development” are
still installed:
Go to Programs and Features, select Visual Studio 2105, click Change.
In Visual Studio setup, click Modify.
Deselect the feature “Tools for Universal Windows App Development”
Select “Tools for Universal Windows App Development” again, and click Update.
· If you have already uninstalled the “Tools for Universal
Windows Apps Development”:
· Reinstall “Tools for Universal Windows App Development”
· Or, take the following steps to reinstall the JavaScript
project system and language service:
§ Download the installer for your edition of Visual Studio, e.g.,
vs_community.exe.
§ Open a CMD window, and run the following command: vs_community.exe
/modify /installselectableitems JavaScript_Hidden /passive
Source:
- https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/vstudio/en-US/c9936d80-087d-4cad-93bf-ca4873889773/the-debugger-cannot-continue-running-the-process?forum=vsdebug
In Visual Studio 2015, 2017 and 2019 you can do that:
Go to Tools -> Options -> Debugging -> General
Turn off
"Break all processes when one process breaks"
Solved it by completely uninstalling Visual Studio and ReSharper. I used this tool:
https://github.com/Microsoft/VisualStudioUninstaller
After re-install everything worked again.
In my case detaching from the process and attaching again solved the problem.
I had a same problem but I had a single class library project in a solution so I just rebuild the solution and then it worked.
I have VS 2015 Community using C#. I created a WPF application.
When I hit F5 or play Visual Studio starts to debug the application as normal. I even see the Diagnostics showing Memory Usage and CPU (but it locks up, for example at 20 ms and stays there). The problem is that sometimes the application will open and run when debugging, most the time it does not. Important to note that visual studio itself isn't locking up, just the diagnostic tool window.
If I run without debugging the application opens as normal and there are no problems, but if I want debugging the application doesn't even open.
I am sorry I have no errors to show because I get no errors or warnings. It simply just wont open during debugging.
Is there a patch/update I missed or has anyone had this problem before?
I had what sounds like the same problem. I disabled Enable Diagnostic Tools while debugging in Tools → Options → Debugging. In my case it was some kind of conflict with Symantec (per the event log). Not ideal but being able to debug is better than having diagnostics.
UPDATE
I looked up the help desk ticket I filed for this incident and it was not the event log, I remembered that incorrectly. What was happening was that the edpa.exe process (a Symantec process which is controlled by group policy at my office) was thrashing the processor whenever I would debug. The fix/workaround is the same. I have since got a new PC and I do not experience the problem.
Have you tried restarting Visual Studio / PC or re-building the solution?
It may help.
There should be no conflict with Symantec NIS (current version 22.6.0.142). It (your question submittal plus the accepted answer) sounds more like an available memory issue; my NIS reports high memory usage when I start up VS, so I sometimes (not always) have Diagnostics failing to start up, but debugging always would continue. Perhaps adding more physical memory is the solution for you; but for now, turning off Enable Diagnostic Tools While Debugging is just a bandaid.
I have my service running in IIS. I have a non fatal exception occurring and being logged on startup.
How do I attach Visual Studio to IIS so that it also debugs the startup?
I know I can attached visual studio to the w3wp.exe to debug while its running.
Add the following to your application's start up code:
System.Diagnostics.Debugger.Break();
When this line is hit, you will be prompted to attach a debugger to the process. See Debugger.Break for more details.
If you want to live debug you must have the Remote Debugging tools installed on the web server. Make sure to use the correct version for the version of Visual Studio you are running.
Compile your project in debug mode, make sure "Emit debug information" is checked in the Advanced Precompile Settings.
Deploy your project to the server. It is critical that the code in visual studio matches exactly what you deployed. Do not try to debug against even minor differences in code (web.config setting differences are ok).
Run the remote debugging tools on the server with an administrator account. You should see it say "... Waiting for new connections".
In visual studio, use Attach to Process from the Debug menu to attach to the w3wp process on the server. Make sure the Qualifier is the server name:port number that the remote tools is listening on.
In some cases, you may need to click the "Select..." button in the Attach to Process window and select only "Managed (v4.5, v4.0)" code types instead of letting it automatically determine code type. If your break points never get hit because no symbols were loaded, this could be why.
Tip: assign a specific app pool to your IIS application so it is easier to identify in the Attach to Process window. You may have a bunch of w3wp.exe processes and you may not know which one you want to attach to.
As an alternative to live debugging, you could run an intellitrace on the server, bring the trace file back into visual studio and step through the code like it is a recorded session. This is a whole other set of instructions involving powershell. I prefer live debugging if it is an option.
UPDATE:
To step into Application_Start(), recycle the App Pool and then attach Visual Studio before any requests come in to be sure you are debugging when you (or anyone) makes the first request.
You can also use below code snippet. It is equally handy -
System.Diagnostics.Debugger.Launch();
Wheneever you place it in code, it launches Visual Studio's JIT debugger at that very spot as shown below. As already suggested in the accepted answer you can place this code in application's start-up code at the very first line:
You can then choose and attach to any new or already running instance of Visual Studio across all versions installed on your machine. Hope this helps someone!
Happens with some occasion.
Running Windows 8 x64, with Visual Studio 2012 Professional (also happened before in VS 2010).
C# console project being debugged with "Enable native code debugging".
Pressing F5, debugging some code, reaching breakpoints, etc. then pressing Shift+F5 (Stop Debugging) and the Visual Studio does not return to editing mode as normally, it just hangs for a while and then gives an option to terminate the hanging operation (dialog window "A remote operation is taking longer than expected" with progress bar and Terminate button). If I don't click to terminate, it stays there just updating the progress bar.
If I click to terminate the operation, VS returns back to editable mode but the debugged process is still visible in Task Manager and its not killable. This pending debug process locks certain files it uses (e.g. DLLs) so further rebuild is not possible. The only way to kill this process is to restart the machine.
Interestingly it happens when the breakpoints are reached in debugged code and debugging is performed step by step. If I just run the debugging process without breakpoints then the hang does not occur.
Solutions in the following thread didn't help: https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/504538/
We have faced similar issues before using 2010, but couldn't figure out the root cause yet.
The workaround was to run the process separately (console, double click the .exe) and do Debug->Attach To Process.
Note: If you wanna debug start up code then this might not be a good idea.
I was experiencing some serious unaccountable issues regarding file locks and weird behaviour of the debugger a while ago. I solved them by activating application experience service. I don't know why but after activating it all my problems regarding debugging silently vanished...
I came across a similar hanging problem and solved it. Trying it may heal your wound (it is for windows forms, but since you're on console, it is worth giving a try):
Windows Form Won't Display in Debug Mode
Please let me know if it works or not.
I am having a rather bizarre error when trying to debug a .NET web application.
My system: Windows 7 Ultimate (IIS7), Visual Studio 2008, DotNetNuke 4.8.2.
I have a Web Application which I am trying to attach the debugger to w3wp.exe. I set a breakpoint in my code: could be an ascx.cs page or a library I am referencing.
Here's the weird part. Once I run through that part of the website, the code breaks, and I am able to debug, step through between 1-20 lines of code, and all of a sudden it's as if I pressed Continue. The timing doesn't seem significant (sometimes it happens after 2 minutes, sometimes after 2 seconds) and there are no error messages in the output or Event Viewer.
If I try to attach the debugger with managed and native, it goes to disassembly mode for w3wp. Again, no real obvious error.
Anyone can at least point me in the right direction as to what could be interrupting the debugger? Without any error messages, I cannot even begin to figure out where to go next.
I've tried:
Rebuilding the website configuration in IIS
Check the app pool settings to make sure it's not timing out
disabled every conceivable service on my computer
Resetting my Visual Studio settings
Rebuilding the project
This is a bug in the VS2008 SP1 debugger. MS released a hotfix some time ago:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/957912
The bug is described on that page as:
Stepping when you debug a managed
multithreaded application can randomly
turn into a "go"