I want to use debug symbols, but I am receiving the following error:
a matching symbol file was not found in this folder
What is this problem, and how to solve it?
One of the things I've ran into with was because debug was off on the project referenced where the code lives. In my case, I made a new configuration called "Developer" and by default debug was turned off.
Right click the project in question
Properties
Build
Advanced (right bottom corner)
Set Debug Info to full
Recompile
I had the same problem as #DmainEvent. Apparently the dll that I was using was not the same version as the pdb that I had just compiled, so I got the error message.
If you have this problem, try using the dll and pdb from the same compilation run.
The error I got was "a matching symbol file was not found in this folder" in the Debug => Modules window even after both the DLL and PDB were available and built together, so I was unable to debug into the target DLL referenced by my main project.
Posting this here in case it helps someone browsing with "Mixed Platform" build for target DLL. I did two things to get past this:
In the solution using the target DLL, Uncheck "Just My Code" in Tools => Options => Debugging => General => Enable Just My Code (JMC).
Check "Enable native code debugging" in target DLL solution in relevant Project Properties => Debug.
I tried all the possible solutions, finally it worked when I disabled the option Enable native code debugging under the Debugger engines of Properties > Debug.
I ran into this problem and the answer was simple.
Visual studio has two project level settings that can create .pdb files.
Linker: Configuration Properties -> Linker -> Debugging -> Generate
Program Database File = "xxxx.pdb"
Compiler: Configuration Properties -> C/C++ -> Output Files -> Program Database File Name =
"yyyy.pdb"
You want #1 for debugging. Forget about #2.
Give file #2 a different name than file #1 to solve this error.
I don't know why microsoft specifies #2 as a .pdb file. That is just confusing.
I have fixed my debug symbols, forcing them to match using this tool:
chkmatch tool
edit: the website is down now. the wayback machine helps: https://web.archive.org/web/20210205095232/https://www.debuginfo.com/tools/chkmatch.html
So, my problem was I was trying to debug my project and the debugger couldn't step-in to the in-house nugets sources. I had the source files of the nuget project. Still the visual studio didn't accept the pdb files I was trying to show it to.
Showing exact same error:
a matching symbol file was not found in this folder
So, what I did was I added this to the .proj file of the nugets project:
<DebugType>full</DebugType>
And created the dll and pdb file again using the rebuild option.
In the command line I ran:
.\ChkMatch.exe -m name_of_your.dll name_of_your.pdb
It said this:
Writing to the debug information file...
Result: Success.
Great success!
So, next, I referenced this dll instead to the proj I was trying to debug. I worked when I tried to load the symbol again.
Hope it helps.
Without more details as to what you're doing, it's difficult to go beyond "the debugger is looking for a symbol file which matches the compiled code, and couldn't find one in the folder where the compiled code lives."
Some things to think about:
Are you creating symbols as part of your compilation? (check the project properties)
Are you using a symbol server (if so, does it point to the right place)
Is this compiled code from a third party? In which case, as you apparently have the source, compile it yourself.
Consider clarifying your question if you want a better answer. Especially what do you mean by "I want use of Symbols".
For BizTalk (and other) projects, it could be because there's a version of the assembly you're trying to debug already in the GAC. When you run a unit test or hit F5 to debug, a new version is compiled locally. However, the version in the GAC is being used, and the newly created PDB doesn't match the DLL in the GAC.
One way around this is to deselect a build for everything except your unit test project using the Configuration Manager, as shown below:
Well, the solution depends on your specific problem. I tried everything that could be possibly found on Stackoverflow and other sites. One of the thread that I followed is this. That did not help too.
The problem was at once resolved when I noticed that my executable project did not contain a reference to the library that I wanted to debug. So I just added the reference to that project.
**PS: ** This problem might also arise because the assembly referenced by the executable assembly might not match that in the references. So in that case, you just remove the already existing reference and add the new one.
Hope this helps!
The same happen to me because the .pdb file of the project have not been copied to the debug\Bin folder, so the symbols could not be loaded from the .pdb file.
You must rebuild your project and manually copy the symbols (.pdb file) to the debug\Bin folder of executable project.
I was trying to load symbols for a installed nuget package published on our local dev server. I had to uninstall and add a normal reference built from the code instead. This worked for me. Just remember install the original nuget package again once finished debugging.
If it works for you, try to embed debug symbols in the dll itself, so the symbols are loaded automatically. This worked for me in netcoreapp3.1 and net5.0:
<DebugType>Embedded</DebugType>
<EmbedAllSources>True</EmbedAllSources>
Beware that you may find this in documentation:
<AllowedOutputExtensionsInPackageBuildOutputFolder>$(AllowedOutputExtensionsInPackageBuildOutputFolder);.pdb</AllowedOutputExtensionsInPackageBuildOutputFolder>
but it does not work.
I ran into this with Visual Studio 2022, tried the most of answers here. Fixed by switching back to Visual Studio 2019, seems like a bug in 2022.
My issue was a bit simpler to resolve, but still the issue the question asked. At first, I was not publishing the pdb file with the nuget package another project was using. Once I confirmed that, I removed the nuget package from my project and readded it from our network nuget source. That still didn't let Visual Studio pick identify the PDB location.
Then I noticed that if you select one of your nuget packages, ( Project --> Dependencies --> Packages --> Choose nuget package), there is a Path property. I checked that location and it pointed to %USERPROFILE%.nuget\packages. The pdb was not at this location and the Date Modified was older than the latest package I published. Once I deleted the folder for the given package version, removed it from my project, and re-added it, the latest .dll and .pdb file were added to this location.
After that, I was able to step into the code of my nuget package and had no further issues.
To get the nuget project to produce the pdb file in the first place, I added <IncludeSymbols>true</IncludeSymbols> inside of a PropertyGroup within the csproj file as other answers had directed.
Once I rebuilt that nuget project, it generated 2 *.nupkg files:
Namespace.x.x.x.x.nupkg
Namespace.x.x.x.x.symbols.nupkg
I found this was because the Properties => Debug => Start Action was set to Start external program instead of the Project. So the newly generated pdb file didn't match, because the actual exe was the wrong one.
I have had this problem recently as well.
Was able to fix it by selecting MyProject->Properties->Linker->Debugging->Generate Debug Info->"Optimize for debugging (/DEBUG)".
Related
Im releasing a nuget package and I'd like that whoever is using it could step into it as if it was his own code.
In order to do that, in the RELEASE configuration (which is the one I use for distribution), I try set the "Debug Information:" to Embedded and Portable but none did the trick! When I install the package, the pub files are never there...
What am I doing wrong?
The answer from memory is:
Visual Studio has a config setting for a Symbol Server which must point to source code with the same pdb file produced with the compile used for creating the nuget package.
There are different ways to host the symbol server. The easiest is to simply clone the repo from same version the nuget package was created from. Compile that code to generate the pdb. Then point the symbol server config to the bin folder containing the pdb of that compile.
Reboot visual studio.
Now try to single step into that code.
The real symbol server is produced as a website. Plenty of doc. On how to do that.
I have a NuGet package I created and installed in another solution but now I need to debug the code of the package when called from my new solution.
I tried referencing the solution of the package but it's not working.
I am using Visual Studio 2013.
To debug any dll you need the symbol file of it (.pdb). If you build your project in the debug configuration you will see that those files are generated and put in the build output folder.
Visual studio loads those symbol files from different places as described here. The easiest way to debug your nuget packages is to put the .pdb files of the packages in the build output folder of the project you want to debug.
If the code you are trying to debug is classified as non-user code you need to uncheck Just My Code in the debugging options.
The following quote from the Microsoft - Visual Studio Docs shows what counts as user and what as non-user code.
User and non-user code
To distinguish user code from non-user code, Just My Code looks at
symbol (.pdb) files and program optimizations. The debugger considers
code to be non-user code when the binary is optimized or when the .pdb
file is not available.
Three attributes also affect what the debugger considers to be My
Code:
DebuggerNonUserCodeAttribute tells the debugger that the code it is applied to is not My Code.
DebuggerHiddenAttribute hides the code from the debugger, even if Just My Code is turned off.
DebuggerStepThroughAttribute tells the debugger to step through the code it is applied to, rather than step into the code.
All other code is considered to be user code.
A more detailed answer can be found on my blog.
For Visual Studio 2017 and your nuget package source code hosted on GitHub or BitBucket:
Enable full debug information in *.csproj file:
<PropertyGroup Condition="'$(Configuration)'=='Debug'">
<DebugType>full</DebugType>
<DebugSymbols>true</DebugSymbols>
</PropertyGroup>
or right-click project properties, build, advanced, output debugging information - set to full.
To enable automatic source download and stepping for your nuget package dll, add nuget package SourceLink.Create.CommandLine to your project, or add it manually into *.csproj file:
<ItemGroup>
<PackageReference Include="SourceLink.Create.CommandLine" Version="2.8.2" PrivateAssets="All" />
</ItemGroup>
More info here.
In tools - options - debugging, disable "Enable Just My Code", and enable "Suppress JIT optimization on module load (Managed Only)".
After this, you should be able to step inside methods from your nuget package dll.
I got this working by building the project the nuget package originated from in debug mode, then just copying the pdb and dll from the debug directory to the location of the nuget dll within the project I wanted to debug it in.
e.g copy from
ExternalNugetPackage\bin\Debug\
to
ProjectDirectory\Packages\ExternalNugetPackage.1.0.0\lib\net4.5
There is a much simpler solution:
Simply embed the debug symbols in the dll. Update your nupkg, et voila!
How to debug code in a nuget package created by me
Just as NtFreX answered, "To debug any dll you need the symbol file of it (.pdb). ". So you can create symbol packages which allow consumers to step into your package code in the Visual Studio debugger.
The way we do it (and works):
Create "*.symbols.nupkg".
Deploy symbol package to SymbolSource server.
Configure IDE, Package consumers can add https://nuget.smbsrc.net/ to your symbol sources in Visual Studio.
Add required Library to project using NuGet (from our SymbolSource server).
Debug.
For the detail info, you can refer to Creating symbol packages.
If these packages are not suitable for publishing on NuGet Gallery/SymbolSource, you can put the *.nupkg and *.symbols.nupkg files on a local disk.
Note: Add the source code to the Debug Source Files for the solution that references the package(Right click on Solution, select Properties...Common Properties...Debug Source Files, and add the root source directory for the relevant binary reference)
As it might help someone else, here is an additional explanation of the problem in-hand.
What do I need to debug a pkg created by me?
As others here said. the .pdb file.
Also, the source code as expressed here.
Well, how can I include the source code of my nuget package?
I got to include the symbol packages. This answer here showed me how.
I got this working by packing the package in debug mode and installing it from my local NuGet source. Then when you debug you can step into your library. You can add your NuGet local source that points to your local folder in Tools -> Options -> Nuget Package Manager -> Package Sources
Just try to use this on a function called from nuget
Picture
It Works for me
I'm unable to debug a project. I'm getting the "The breakpoint will not currently be hit. No symbols have been loaded for this document" error. I've tried everything I could find online, but nothing has worked. I'm hoping someone out there will be a fresh pair of eyes to find the problem.
First of all, I inherited this project from a coworker who has left. He did development on his machine where he was able to debug it. He uploaded it to Subversion which is where I got it. Another coworker was able to download it and debug, but I cannot.
Second, I'm using Visual Studio 2015. The project is an asp MVC project. There are two projects in the solution: the main project with the views, controllers, models, etc. and the secondary project which is only the Telerik.OpenAccess code (the "data layer"). It's this secondary project that I can't debug.
* Update *
Following a suggestion on another board, I hit a break point in my main project and went to Debug-Windows-Modules where I can see the message "Binary was not built with debug information". I went to the folder shown and can see my pdb file was not made at the same time as my latest dll fill. My project is set to debug mode and build. What do I need to change to get the pdb file to be recreated along with my dll?
* End Update *
So here's the line in the main project I've got my breakpoint:
rep.UpdateWorkOrderVendorHeader(oaObj);
The breakpoint hits here. It's calling a function in the secondary project. When I try to step into that function, it skips to the next line in the main project. If I look in the secondary project, I see the "symbols not loaded error". I also have a breakpoint directly inside the secondary project and still it gets skipped:
I've found two stackoverflow streams that covered a variety of scenarios, but nothing has worked for me:
Fixing "The breakpoint will not currently be hit. No symbols have been loaded for this document."
The breakpoint will not currently be hit. No symbols have been loaded for this document in a Silverlight application
Here is everything I think I've tried so far, but I may have missed something:
Restarted Visual Studio
Deleted code and copied code from co-worker that could debug secondary project
Build - Clean and Rebuild & Clean and Build
Deleting bin and obj folders
Checked configuration set to debug and build
Checked debug and trace constants are checked in the project properties
Click Debug - Start new instance on secondary project
Selecting multiple startup project (threw error saying the secondary project could not be started directly)
Debugging in IE instead of Chrome
Checked the reference to the secondary project in the main project has the correct directory
Checked that Project - Properties - Build - Optimize code was unchecked
Checked that Project - Properties - Build - Advanced settings were the same for both projects
Checked that Project - Properties - Build - Advanced - Output was set to full
Adding to the secondary project's App.config
Making sure I was running Visual Studio as administrator
Checked that Project - Properties - Build - Output path was /bin
I'll include seem screenshots of the config and properties below. Below is also a description of my project tree with some of the relevant files. I'd appreciate any suggestions you can give me. Thank you!
Koorsen (main project)
References
Koorsen.OpenAccess (secondary project)
C:\inetpub\wwwroot\Koorsen\Koorsen.OpenAccess\bin\Debug\Koorsen.OpenAccess.dll
bin
Koorsen.dll
Koorsen.pdb
Koorsen.OpenAccess (secondary project)
bin
Debug
Koorsen.OpenAccess.dll.config
Koorsen.OpenAccess.pdb
Koorsen.OpenAccess.dll
Telerik.OpenAccess.35.Extensions.dll
Telerik.OpenAccess.35.Extensions.xml
Telerik.OpenAccess.dll
Telerik.OpenAccess.xml
Release
Koorsen.OpenAccess.dll
Koorsen.OpenAccess.dll.config
Koorsen.OpenAccess.pdb
Telerik.OpenAccess.35.Extensions.dll
Telerik.OpenAccess.35.Extensions.xml
Configuration Manager:
Build properties:
Advanced debug properties for main project:
Advanced debug properties for secondary project:
Didn't receive an answer, but I was able to figure this out over a couple of days of trial and error. Posting this here in case it helps someone. Here is what I ended up doing.
Put a break point in the main project and ran the solution. When it hit the break point, I went to Debug->Windows->Modules. Found the name of the dll for the secondary project and noted the folder it was trying to use. I my case it was in C:\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v4.0.30319\Temporary ASP.NET Files\vs\213421ba\66682af2\assembly\dl3\e121f20c\957624fe_d9ded101. The dll and pdb files did not have the same date. Rebuilt the project; the dll was updated, but not the pdb. Found a suggestion in another forum suggesting deleting the dll and pdb and rebuilding. This didn't work; the dll was recreated, but not the pdb. I deleted the entire vs folder.
Used NuGet package manager to uninstall and reinstall 2 Telerik Data Access packages to all projects.
Deleted the bin and obj folders in the secondary and main projects. May have been able to get away with just doing this in the secondary project.
At this point the secondary project compiled, but the main project did not.
Had to add some dll files back to the bin folder of the main project from third party extensions.
Still would not compile. Compared every reference, bin and obj file to those of a coworker who was having the same problem, but hadn't tried to fix being able to debug yet. Found 3 extra references. Removed them and the project worked again and I was able to debug the Telerik Open Access project.
So, as the title reads, I have a VS2010 solution with ~50 projects in it right now. If I make a change to a "top level" project that nothing references then VS still rebuilds all 50 projects. I'm running Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate without any add-ons. I am using ILMerge to consolidate all of the projects into a single file.
I have verified this by checking the time stamps of the lower level dlls and see that they are indeed rebuilt even though their code wasn't touched.
I've read all responses and comments for:
Visual Studio 2008 keeps rebuilding
Visual studio keeps building everything
Strange VS2010 build glitch occurs in my solution
Reasons for C# projects to rebuild in Visual Studio
But most of them just offer suggestions on unloading projects to speed up build times but nothing concrete as to a fix. I'm trying to figure out why VS thinks these dependent projects need to be rebuilt when they don't and fix it.
I've turned on 'Tools > Options > Projects and Solutions > Build and Run > Only build startup projects and dependencies on run' but with no effect.
Also, if I just rebuild a "mid-level" project that only has 8 (in)direct dependencies then it still builds all 8 projects even though ILMerge isn't invoked and none of the dependent projects have been modified.
Thank you everyone for any insight you may be able to provide.
Added
To test some of the suggestions I created a new WinForms project from scratch. I then created two new projects inside that solution. I copied all of the code and resources (not project file) from my two 'lowest level' projects into the two brand new projects (I did this by dropping the files and folders from Explorer onto the project in Visual Studio).
The lowest project, let's call it B, did not reference any other project. The next project, A, referenced B only. So once I added the required .NET and external assembly references to the projects then the solution would build.
I then had my new WinForm project reference A and did a full build. So the ref chain is:
WinForm -> A -> B
I then modified WinForm only and did a standard build (F6). As before, Visual Studio rebuilt all three projects.
After some systematic eleminiation of source files in project B I found that if I removed my Resources.Designer.cs and Resources.resx (and commented out the code that made use of the .Properties.Resources object of those resources) then a modification of WinForm would no longer rebuild the entire solution and would only rebuild WinForm.
Adding the Resources.resx and Resources.Designer.cs back to project B (but leaving the referenced code commented out so that nothing was making use of the resources) would re-introduce the full build behavior.
To see if perhaps my resource files were corrupted, I deleted them again and then created a new one (via Project Properties -> Resources) and re-added the same resource as before, which was a single Excel file. With this setup the full rebuild would still occur.
I then removed the single resource, but left the resource file in project B. Even with no resources added, but the resource file still in the project, the full (unneeded) rebuild would occur.
It appears that just having a resource file added to a (.NET 3.5) project will cause Visual Studio 2010 to always rebuild that project. Is this a bug or intended/expected behavior?
Thanks all again!
Open Tools - Options, select Projects and Solutions - Build and Run in tree, then set "MSBuild project build output verbosity" to Diagnostic.
This will output the reason for building a project, i.e.
Project 'ReferencedProject' is not up to date. Project item
'c:\some.xml' has 'Copy to Output Directory' attribute set to 'Copy
always'.
or
Project 'MyProject' is not up to date. Input file
'c:\ReferencedProject.dll' is modified after output file
'c:\MyProject.pdb'.
In this case the fix is to copy some.xml only if newer.
Pre and post build events can trigger build as well.
While I don't think this is a fix, it is a workaround that has worked for my situation...
I originally had about 5 projects out of 50 that contained a Resources section. These projects would always be rebuilt and thus anything that they depended on would also be rebuilt. One of those 5 projects was a "base" level library that 48 of the other projects referenced, thus 96% of my project would be rebuilt every time even if it didn't need it.
My workaround was to use dependency injection, interfaces, and a dedicated "Resources" project. Instead of having those 5 projects reference their own Resources object, I created an interface in each project that would supply the desired resources. Then, the classes that needed those resources would require that interface be passed in during their creation in the constructor (constructor injection).
I then created a separate "Resources" project that had an actual Resources section like normal. This project only contained the resources themselves, and a class for each interface that was needed to provide those resources via an interface. This project would reference every other project that had a resource dependency and implement the interface that the project needed.
Finally, in my "Top Level" project which nothing referenced (and where the exe was actually built and my composition root lives) I referenced the "Resources" project, wired up the DI, and away we went.
This means that only two projects (the "Resources" and the "Top Level") will be rebuilt every time, and if I do a partial build (Shift-F6) then they won't get rebuilt at all.
Again, not a great work around, but with 48 projects being built every time a build would take about 3 minutes, so I was losing 30 to 90 minutes a day with needless rebuilds. It took awhile to refactor, but I think it was a good investment.
Here is a simplified diagram. Note that the dependencies from Main.exe to Proj1 and Proj2 are not shown in order to reduce clutter.
With this design, I can do a build of Proj1 or Proj2 without triggering a full rebuild, since they don't have any dependencies on a Resources section. Only Main knows about the Resources implementation.
This happens when a project has a file that doesn't really exist.
The project can't determine if the file was changed (because it's not there) so it rebuilds.
Simply look at all the files in the project, and search for the one that doesn't have an expandable arrow near it.
I had the same issue in VS 2015.
What did the trick for me is:
One project was referencing itself copy in some other project bin (magic, yes). This kind of stuff could be found when switching to diagnostic build output (in build options) and then trying to build projects one by one from the top of projects hierarchy - if you see the project that rebuilds even if nothing has been changed then see it's references.
I've changed all "copy always" files in all projects to "copy if newer". Basically, in all .csproj files replace <CopyToOutputDirectory>Always</CopyToOutputDirectory>
to <CopyToOutputDirectory>PreserveNewest</CopyToOutputDirectory>
Then I've disabled NTFS tunneling as described in this article with this powershell script:
New-ItemProperty "HKLM:\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\FileSystem" -Name "MaximumTunnelEntries" -Value 0 -PropertyType "DWord"
After that I needed on rebuild and it seems working for now.
In my case the culprit was "Copy Local" setting of a referenced dll set to true and "Copy to Output Directory" setting a file set to Copy always.
For .Net Core Projects, all solutions above are not working.
I've found the solution. In case you are using Visual Studio 2019:
Build the solution twice
Turn on Tools -> Options -> Projects and Solutions -> SDK-Style Projects -> Logging Level -> Verbose
Clear the output window
Build your start project
Inspect the output window. All the string starting with FastUpToDate
You will find some project items that are making your project not up to date.
Fix these issues and try again from step 1. If your fixes are correct, you will achieve Build: 0 succeeded, 0 failed, {n} up-to-date, 0 skipped in the last string of build output.
The MSBuild team is collecting documentation about investigating build incrementality issues here:
https://github.com/Microsoft/MSBuild/wiki/Rebuilding%20when%20nothing%20changed
UPDATED LINK: https://github.com/dotnet/msbuild/blob/main/documentation/wiki/Rebuilding-when-nothing-changed.md
Based on your observations, it sounds like you have projects expressing dependencies to other projects in a way that isn't obvious. It is possible for orphaned dependencies to remain in project files without being apparent in the UI. Have you looked through a misbehaving project file after opening it in a text editor? Checked solution build dependencies?
If you're not able to spot anything, try recreating one of your projects from scratch to see if the new project exhibits the same problem. If the clean project builds correctly, you'll know that you have unwanted dependencies expressed somewhere. As far as I know, these would have to be in the project file(s) or the solution file, unless you have makefiles or other unusual build steps.
Another problem that frequently happens is when some item in your solution has a modified stamp that is in the future. This can happen if you set your clock forward, and then set your clock to the correct time. I had this happen while installing Linux.
In this case you can recursively touch all the files using git bash (yes, in Windows):
find . -exec touch {} \;
I've finally found one more culprit that I had hard time finding by increasing the build log verbosity.
In some cases, MSBuild looks for vc120.pdb in the output folder, and if this file doesn't exist, it will rebuild the entire project. This occurs even if you have disabled debug symbol generation.
The workaround here is to enable debug symbols and let this file get generated, then disable the setting again without deleting the PDB file.
I had this same problem and it turned out to be related to a couple of project that had a copy local reference to a dll in their own output directory.
The key to finding this was having diagnostic output set for the build output, but also knowing what to look for in the log. Searching for: 'not up to date' was the key.
Here is an answer from VS2010 always rebuilds solution?
This issue is solved by changing the project files, cleaning solution,
deleting all bin folders by hand, restarting Visual studio and
rebuilding everything.
I had the same issues with you.
I found that it came from some deleted files.
When I had removed the files from my project, the issues was gone.
Regards.
For this category of build problems setting MSBuild output verbosity to 'diagnostic' is indeed a necessary first step. Most of the time the stated reason for the re-builds would be enough to act upon, BUT occasionally MSBuild would erroneously claim that some files are modified and need to be copied.
If that is the case, you'd need to either disable NTFS tunneling or duplicate your output folder to a new location. Here it is in more words.
I had the problem of Visual Studio rebuilding projects when upgrading from Visual Studio 2015 to 2017 and I add this answer for the benefit of those who might experience similar problems, as it does not seem to be documented anywhere.
In my case, the problem was that all projects in the solution had the same intermediate Output path (obj). The file GeneratedInternalTypeHelper.cs gets generated by all projects containing XAML. Up to Visual Studio 2015, the build process apparently did not check for the file date of this file and thus no problem with it occurred. With VS2017 the file date of this file is checked and because a later project in the build process will overwrite it (with the same content), the earlier project will re-build, re-triggering the later build, ad infinitum.
The solution in this case is to ensure that all projects have differing intermediate output directories, which will make the problem go away.
In my case (mixed C#, C++/CLI and native C++ solution) , some C++ projects were being re-linked even if nothing had changed. I spent ages trying to work out what was happening. In the end I worked out from the "Command Line" option that the PDB output path (option /Fd) could not handle the folder setting $(IntDir). I removed that - an empty value will do the default correctly - and my issue went away.
As others have noticed, a likely reason is that CopyToOutputDirectory is set to Always. This can be fixed simultaneously in all project files by applying the powershell script below:
$folder = "C:\My\Solution\Folder"
$csvFiles = Get-ChildItem $folder *.csproj -rec
foreach ($file in $csvFiles)
{
(Get-Content $file.PSPath -Encoding UTF8 -Raw) |
Foreach-Object { $_ -replace "<CopyToOutputDirectory>Always</CopyToOutputDirectory>", "<CopyToOutputDirectory>PreserveNewest</CopyToOutputDirectory>" } |
Set-Content $file.PSPath -Encoding UTF8 -NoNewline
}
Files that do not exist are a problem and obviously files producing no output as well. That can happen, wenn you have a resource file in a static library. (C++)
This is driving me crazy.
I have a rather large project that I am trying to modify. I noticed earlier that when I typed DbCommand, visual studio did not do any syntax highlighting on it, and I am using using System.Data.Common.
Even though nothing was highlighted, the project seemed to be running fine in my browser. So I decided to run the debugger to see if things were really working as they should be.
Every time the class that didn't do the highlighting is called I get the "the source file is different from when the module was built" message.
I cleaned the solution and rebuilt it several times, deleted tmp files, followed all the directions here Getting "The source file is different from when the module was built.", restarted the web server and still it tells me the source files are different when they clearly are not.
I cannot test any of the code I have written today because of this.
How can the source be different than the binary when I just complied
it?
Is there any way to knock some sense into visual studio, or am
I just missing something?
I got this issue running a console app where the source that was different was the source that had the entry-point (static void Main). Deleting the bin and obj directories and doing a full rebuild seemed to correct this, but every time I made a code change, it would go out-of-date again.
The reason I found for this was:
I had checked "Only build startup projects and dependencies on Run" (Tools -> Options -> Projects and Solutions -> Build and Run)
In Configuration Manager, my start-up project didn't have "Build" checked
(For #2 -> accessible via the toolbar under the 'Debug/Release' drop down list.)
I was just having this same problem, my projects were all in the same solution so they were using Project to Project references, so as one changed the others should have been updated. However it was not the case, I tried to build, rebuild, close VS2010, pulled a new copy from our source control. None of this worked, what I finally ended up trying was right clicking on the project and rebuilding each project individually. That updated the .dlls and .pdb files so I could debug through.
The issue here is that your dll and or your pdb files are not in sync.
Follow these steps
Just delete the bin directory from the project where the DLL is generated.
Re-build the project.
Remove reference from the project that make reference to the DLL.
Include again the reference.
Enjoy.
In addition to these answers I had the same issue while replacing new DLLs with old ones because of the wrong path. If you are still getting this error you may not refer the wrong path for the DLLs. Go to IIS manager and click the website which uses your DLLs. On the right window click Advanced Settings and go to path of the Physical Path folder on File Explorer and be sure that you are using this folder to replace your DLLs.
Some things for you to check:
Have you double checked your project references?
Do you have a Visual Studio started web server still running? Check the system tray and look for a page with a cog icon (you may have more than one):
(source: msdn.com)
Right click and close/exit it. You may have more than one. Can you debug your changes now?
Are you running the debug version but have only built the release version (or vice versa)?
Did the compile actually succeed? I know I've clicked through the "there were errors, do you want to continue anyway?" message a couple of times without realising.
With web services, the problem can be caused by using the Visual Studio "View in Browser" command. This places the service's DLL and PDB files in the bin and obj folders. When stepping into the web service from a client, somehow Visual Studio uses the PDB in the bin (or obj) folder, but it uses the DLL in the project's output build folder. There are a couple workarounds:
Try deleting the DLL and PDB files in the web service bin and obj files.
Try clicking "View in Browser" in Visual Studio.
If you previously got the source file mismatch error, Visual Studio might have added the filename to a black list. Check your solution properties. Choose "Common Properties -> Debug Source Files" on the left side of the dialog box. If your web service source files appear in the field "Do not look for these source files", delete them.
Unload the project that has the file that is causing the error.
Reload the project.
Fixed
I just had this issue.
I tried all the above, but only this worked:
delete the .pdb file for the solution.
delete the offending .obj files (for the file being reported out of sync)
build the solution.
This fixed the issue for all builds moving forward for me.
In Visual Studio 2017 deleting the hidden .vs folder in the resolved this issue for me.
This is how I fixed the problem in Visual Studio 2010:
1) Change the 'Solutions Configurations' option from "Debug" to "Release"
2) Start debugging
3) Stop debugging and switch the 'Solutions Configurations' option back to "Debug"
This worked for me. Step 3 is optional - it was working fine when I changed it to "Release" but I wanted to change it back.
My solution:
I had included an existing project from a different solution in a new solution file.
I did not notice that when the existing project was rebuilt, it was putting the final output into the NEW solution's output directory. I had a linker path defined to look into the OLD solution's output directory.
Switching my project to search in the new solution's output directory fixed this issue for me.
I had this problem, and it turns out I was running my console application as a windows application. Switching the output type back to console fixed the issue.
I had the same problem. To fix it I used the "Release Mode" to debug in VS2013. Which is sufficient for me, because I'm working in a node js\c++ addon.
My problem was that I had two projects in my solution. The second one was a test project used to call the first one. I had picked the path to the references from the bin folder's release folder.
So whenever I made a change to the first project's code and rebuilt it, it would update the dlls in the debug folder but the calling project was pointing to the release folder, giving me the error, "the source file is different from when the module was built."
Once I deleted the reference to the main project's dll in the release folder and set it to the dll in the debug folder, the issue went away.
In my case, the #Eliott's answer doesn't work.
To solve this problem I had Exclude/Include From Project my deficient file, andalso Clean and Rebuild the solution.
After these actions, my file with my last modifications and the debugger are restored.
I hope this help.
solution:-
the problem is:-
if your some projects in a solution , refer to some other projects,
then sometimes the dll of some projects, will not update automatically, whenever you build the solution,
some projects will have previous build dlls, not latest dlls
you have to go manually and copy the dll of latest build project into referenced project
I was using Visual Studio 2013 and I had an existing project under source control.
I had downloaded a fresh copy from source control to a new directory.
After making changes to the fresh copy, when building I received the error in question.
My solution:
1) Open Documents\IISExpress\config\applicationhost.config
2) Update virtualDirectory node with directory to the fresh copy and save.
My problem was that I had a webservice in the project and I changed the build path.
Restoring the default build path solved my issue.
I had this same problem and I followed the majority of the guidance in the other answers posted here, nothing seemed to work for me.
I eventually opened IIS and recycled the application pool for my web application. I have IIS version 8.5.9600, I right-clicked my web application, then: Deploy > Recycle > Recycle application pool > OK.
That seems to have fixed it, breakpoints now being hit as expected. I think that doing this along with deleting the bin and obj folders helped my situation.
Good luck!
I know this is an old question but I just had the same problem and wanted to post here in case it helps someone else. I got a new computer and the IT dept merged my old computer with the new one. When I set up TFS, I mapped a different local path than what I was previously using, to an additional internal drive. The old path still existed from the merged data on my hard drive so I could still build and run. My IIS paths were also pointing to the old directory. Once I updated IIS to the correct path, I was able to debug just fine. I also deleted the old directory for good measure.
I also experienced that. I just open the obj folder on the project and then open the debug folder delete the .pdb file and that's all.
This error also happens if you try to make changes to a source file that is not part of the project.
I was debugging a method from a .dll of another one of my projects, where Visual Studio had quite helpfully loaded the source because the .dll had been built on the same machine and it knew the path to the source. Obviously, changing such a file isn't going to do anything unless you rebuild the referenced project.
Delete all breakpoints.
Rebuild.
Done
At Visual Studio 2015, using C++, what fixed for me the the source file is different from when the module was built problem was
restart Visual Studio.
Check if the location you pointed to using mex() in Matlab is correct (contains lib and obj files which are modified to the last date you compiled the library in Visual studio).
If this is not the case:
Make sure you are compiling Visual studio in a mode that saves .lib files :
properties -> Config properties -> General -> Config type -> static library
properties -> Config properties -> General -> Target extension=.lib (instead of exe)
Make sure the output and intermediate directories match the Matlab directory in
properties -> Config properties -> General -> Output directory
properties -> Config properties -> General -> Intermediate directory
I get this issue when debugging sometimes w/ Visual Studio but when the application is served by IIS. (we have to develop in this form for some complicated reasons that have to do with how the original developer setup this project.)
When I change the file and rebuild, that fixes it a lot of the time. I know that sounds silly, but I was just trying to debug some code to see why it's doing something weird when I haven't changed it in a while, and I tried a dozen things from this page, but it was fixed just by changing the file..
In my case, the problem was that the debugger exe path was pointing to a net5.0 bin folder. I am using net6.0, so I should've updated the exe path back when I updated the target framework. Works fine now.
Debug-> start without debugging.
This option worked for me. Hope this helps!