Migrating Add-in Solutions from Visual Studio .NET 2002 to Visual Studio .NET 2003

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When you migrate an add-in solution created in Visual Studio .NET 2002 into Visual Studio .NET 2003, the registry values in the add-in's setup project are not automatically updated. You must manually update the registry key in the deployment project to values used in Visual Studio .NET 2003. Otherwise, when you deploy your migrated add-in project, it will not work correctly. The same issue applies with add-ins created for the Macros IDE.

Note   Add-ins created in Visual Studio .NET 2003 will not work correctly in Visual Studio .NET 2002.

To ensure that your add-in registers properly in Visual Studio .NET 2003, you must change the add-in setup project's registry key.

To update a migrated add-in project's registry key

  1. Load your Visual Studio .NET 2002 add-in solution in Visual Studio .NET 2003.
  2. Right-click the add-in's setup project and click Registry on the View menu to display the registry keys for the setup project in the Registry window.
  3. Navigate to the Visual Studio .NET registry keys. If you chose "All Users" when you created the add-in with the Add-in Wizard, then the keys will be under HKLM. Otherwise, they will be under HKCU. Go to HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Visual Studio\7.0. For Macros IDE add-ins, the key is found under HKLM\Software\Microsoft\VSA\7.0.
  4. Select the 7.0 key in the Registry window, and then in the Properties window, change the value of the Name property to 7.1. Do the same to the Macros IDE add-in key if applicable.
  5. Save the solution.

Your add-in should now work correctly when deployed.

Updating the ReCreateCommands.reg file

A file called ReCreateCommand.reg is created when you choose to create a menu item for your add-in using the Add-in Wizard. When run, it resets the IDE menu commands to the settings they had prior to running the wizard.

Note   The ReCreateCommands.reg file appears in Solution Explorer only if you select the Show All Files button on the Solution Explorer toolbar.

For this file to work correctly after migrating an add-in solution to Visual Studio .NET 2003, you must update the same registry key in this file similarly to the way you did for the setup project.

To update the ReCreateCommands.reg file

  1. If you have not done so already, click the Show All Files button in Solution Explorer.
  2. Right-click the ReCreateCommands.reg file and select Open on the context menu.
  3. In the registry keys, change every occurrence of 7.0 to 7.1.
  4. Close the file and save the changes.

The ReCreateCommand.reg file should now work correctly.

See Also

Add-In Registration | Creating Add-Ins and Wizards