Archive
Fix: Visual Studio opens class diagram in XML editor with double click
Recently, to save myself sometime after having renamed some interfaces/classes in the ClipFlair project sourcecode, I right-clicked one of the class diagrams (.cd files) in it at Visual Studio’s “Solution Navigator” (this is an enhanced Solution Explorer addon) and using “Open With…” I opened up the diagrams with the XML editor to do a rename-all operation for the respective class names.
However, after saving the project I found out that from then on, that specific .cd file was opening up as XML file when double-clicked instead of opening up as a Class Diagram in the respective designer pane. Using Open With dialog would open it as a Class Diagram when asked to specifically, but using the checkbox to always open up as Class Diagram wouldn’t help fix the double-click problem for that specific .cd file (others would open up fine as class diagrams, not as XML files, when double-clicked).
I just managed to fix that issue by right clicking the file node in solution navigator’s tree and and excluding that file from the project (not deleting!), then saving the project, closing the solution containg the project and adding the file (via “Add existing file”) again after having reopened the solution. I could also possibly have right clicked selected “Unload project” after saving it and then select to reload it again, think that would have worked too.
Using VisualHG addon for Visual Studio I commited the changes to the Mercurial repository used by ClipFlair on Codeplex, which showed me that the file difference that did the fix was the following in the .csproj project file:
<ItemGroup>
<None Include="Diagrams\Windows.cd" />
- <None Include="Diagrams\Windows.Views.Interfaces.cd">
- <SubType>Designer</SubType>
- </None>
+ <None Include="Diagrams\Windows.Views.Interfaces.cd" />
<None Include="Diagrams\Windows.Views.ViewModels.cd" />
</ItemGroup>
That is instead of that marked-as-bold entry above (marked by the diff tool with – prefix), the line marked with + prefix should be used instead. This is obviously some bug in Visual Studio 2010, it’s nice to know though that you can easily take the project offline and edit the .csproj to fix it (or remove the .cd file, save the project, reload it and add the file again).
HowTo: Make Project Linker extension’s VSIX install at Visual Studio 2012
Project Linker is a Visual Studio Extension that “helps to automatically create and maintain links from a source project to a target project to share code that is common to Silverlight and WPF”.
In ClipFlair, where I have shared code between a Silverlight and a WPF project (I guess same would be for XNA projects for Xbox360 and for PC), a practice I use is to put shared files in a “Source” project and add them to both projects as links (using “Open as link” action available from Add file dialog if you press the dropdown arrow next to the “Open” button).
An alternative is to put such files in say the WPF project and use the Project Linker tool from Microsoft Patterns & Practices group to link to those files from the Silverlight project easily.
However, that tool seems to be only available for Visual Studio 2010, not for the newer 2012 version. Luckily, some users have posted a workarround at the discussion there (Reviews and Q&A tabs):
- Download the .vsix
- Extract contents with 7-Zip (since .vsix is a .zip file which you can see by renaming to .zip or .vsix.zip)
- Modify file with extension .vsixmanifest to add <visualstudio version="11.0"> to the <supportedproducts> node
- Change MaxVersion to <supportedframeworkruntimeedition minversion="3.5" maxversion="4.5" /> (this may not be necessary)
- Zip up contents again
- Rename extension back to .vsix
- Install extension
According to comments there, this works but not for all project types. It works if one links the Silverlight project to the WPF one, but not the other way around. It throws a NullReferenceException somewhere in the extension.
How to crash Visual Studio 2010 via (Silverlight) XAML recursion bug
Following up on a note about Visual Studio 2010 crashing at my previous post, this is the XAML that crashes VS2010 when opened up in a Silverlight project:
<UserControl x:Class="SilverlightApplication1.MainPage"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008"
xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006"
mc:Ignorable="d"
d:DesignHeight="300" d:DesignWidth="400"><UserControl.Resources>
<ResourceDictionary>
<Style x:Key="MyStyle" TargetType="StackPanel">
<Setter Property="Margin" Value="0,5,0,5" />
</Style>
</ResourceDictionary>
</UserControl.Resources><Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Background="White">
<Grid.Resources>
<Style TargetType="StackPanel">
<Setter Property="Style" Value="{StaticResource MyStyle}" /> <!– THIS LINE CRASHES VISUAL STUDIO (EVEN WHEN YOU TRY TO TYPE IT IN) –>
</Style>
</Grid.Resources><StackPanel/>
</Grid>
</UserControl>
This crashes VS2010 upon loading, because it tries to show the XAML page in the designer. I created that XAML in Notepad++ since when I was trying to type the problematic line (marked in the XAML above) it crashed VS2010 immediately before I managed to save.
BTW, you should use the XAML syntax I suggested at my previous post that uses Style inheritance instead (although it would be nice if you could do for any node <X CloneSource=…/> for any XAML node to copy its attributes and values from a same-typed node instance in some resource etc. instead of relying on the node supporting some mechanism like Style does with BasedOn [that is Style Inheritance]).
<Grid.Resources>
<Style TargetType="StackPanel" BasedOn="{StaticResource MyStyle}" />
</Grid.Resources>
Speaking of crashes, VS2010 should be more clever and if it sees a certain file caused a crash (assuming it has info on file being loaded upon or just before crash), the next time of opening the solution it should warn the user against opening that file (to avoid a new crash that stops one from loading the solution).
Note that I tried to open up the XAML file standalone in Visual Studio and it says:
Style object is not allowed to affect the Style property of the object to which it applies.
at System.Windows.Setter.Seal()
at System.Windows.SetterBaseCollection.Seal()
at System.Windows.Style.Seal()
at System.Windows.StyleHelper.UpdateStyleCache(FrameworkElement fe, FrameworkContentElement fce, Style oldStyle, Style newStyle, Style& styleCache)
at System.Windows.FrameworkElement.OnStyleChanged(DependencyObject d, DependencyPropertyChangedEventArgs e)
at System.Windows.DependencyObject.OnPropertyChanged(DependencyPropertyChangedEventArgs e)
at System.Windows.FrameworkElement.OnPropertyChanged(DependencyPropertyChangedEventArgs e)
at System.Windows.DependencyObject.NotifyPropertyChange(DependencyPropertyChangedEventArgs args)
at System.Windows.DependencyObject.UpdateEffectiveValue(EntryIndex entryIndex, DependencyProperty dp, PropertyMetadata metadata, EffectiveValueEntry oldEntry, EffectiveValueEntry& newEntry, Boolean coerceWithDeferredReference, Boolean coerceWithCurrentValue, OperationType operationType)
at System.Windows.DependencyObject.InvalidateProperty(DependencyProperty dp)
at System.Windows.FrameworkElement.UpdateStyleProperty()
at System.Windows.TreeWalkHelper.InvalidateOnTreeChange(FrameworkElement fe, FrameworkContentElement fce, DependencyObject parent, Boolean isAddOperation)
at System.Windows.FrameworkElement.ChangeLogicalParent(DependencyObject newParent)
at System.Windows.FrameworkElement.AddLogicalChild(Object child)
at System.Windows.Controls.UIElementCollection.AddInternal(UIElement element)
at System.Windows.Controls.UIElementCollection.Add(UIElement element)
at System.Windows.Controls.UIElementCollection.System.Collections.IList.Add(Object value)
at Microsoft.Expression.DesignModel.InstanceBuilders.ClrObjectInstanceBuilder.InstantiateChildren(IInstanceBuilderContext context, ViewNode viewNode, DocumentCompositeNode compositeNode, Boolean isNewInstance)
Probably it loads it into an implicit WPF project. So is this some issue with Silverlight 5 XAML loading only? And if so isn’t this a potential exploit against Silverlight apps/plugin (if they allow XAML to be passed to them that is)?
It would be interesting to fix the test solution manually to not try to load the XAML file at startup, then build it and run it to see if it crashes the Silverlight plugin, the web browser, or whatever other side-effects it causes that might be exploitable.
This issue has been submitted to Microsoft at https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/753211/xaml-editor-window-fails-with-catastrophic-failure-when-a-style-tries-to-set-style-property. I have attached a test Silverlight project there (should be available for download soon [takes a while] from issue details)
Fix: The tag XXX does not exist in XML namespace ‘clr-namespace:YYY’
I just had some big trouble troubleshooting the Visual Studio / XAML compiler error message:
The tag XXX does not exist in XML namespace ‘clr-namespace:YYY’
It turned out this occurred because I had a Silverlight library with Assembly name X and default namespace X (at properties pane), but was using it from a demo project with Assembly name X (again!) and default namespace X.
If I removed the ";assembly=X" part from the XAML it worked fine, that is:
xmlns:my="clr-namespace:X"
Fixing the demo project to use Assembly name X.Demo and default namespace X.Demo (at its Properties pane), instead of having the same assembly name, now allows me to also use
xmlns:my="clr-namespace:X;assembly=X"
without problem.
Seems that when you have multiple assemblies with the same name in a project (wonder how the filesystem supports that), all of them are loaded fine and if they have classes with namespace X in them, the namespace gets classes from both assemblies (that’s why the xmlns without assembly=… works). When you specify assembly name in the XAML of a given project, it assumes you mean its own assembly, not any other referenced one with the same name.
BTW, at add references dialog I was using Projects option (to reference the output of other project in solution) and the project I was referencing was named X.Silverlight (can be named anything), I had not added reference the X assembly .dll file directly. Maybe that played its part too in the issue.
There may be other cases too that can cause this error to fire up, see:
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en/wpf/thread/56f933c8-a093-4c47-8e1a-cde4bb1864e9
Fix: Visual Studio 2010 XAML Designer output for WP7 light theme
The other day I submitted my 1st Windows Phone 7 application via http://create.msdn.com
Having registered for free as a student developer (being a PhD student on Robotics) via http://dreamspark.com I could only try my 1st app on WP7 emulator – when it gets accepted I will be able to have my WP7 phone unlocked to try apps there too.
So I was disappointed a bit to get back a certification failure. One of the two reasons stated was that I wasn’t following one key WP7 (design) guideline/requirement: to have the app UI work fine in both dark and light theme of WP7. I was using the default design colors and brushes, not having set any colors explicitly and since the emulator was starting in dark theme by default, this issue slipped my attention (wouldn’t it be nice if the Visual Studio XAML designer allowed you to switch between dark and light theme?).
The (nicely organized) feedback PDF from the Certification step of the WP7 app marketplace submission process was saying:
At first I couldn’t find the settings at the WP7 emulator since the image button pointing to the right to go to the settings page wasn’t visible (probably because of my video card not supporting the latest shader model and running the emulator ignoring the warnings shown that only Silverlight – not XNA – content will show up and probably not always fine – obviously meaning functionality that is implemented using GPU hardware acceleration in the emulator).
Dragging to the left on the 1st screen of the emulator (that just shows IE) takes you to the apps page where you also see Settings and your deployed app (apart from IE). You can hold down mouse on Settings there and select to Pin it to 1st page for easier access. At settings you can change the Theme Background to “light” instead of the default “dark” and try your app again.
In my app’s case indeed you couldn’t see a thing. The article that gave me a hint to what might be happening was:
http://timdams.wordpress.com/2011/06/21/creating-a-wp7-app-supporting-dark-and-light-themes/
and especially the phrase:
when the light theme is active, what WP7 basically does is switch the Foreground and the Background property of all controls, as long as they’re not defined explicitly.
The moment however, you define a specific color for a control, WP7 won’t help you with switching colors anymore
So I took a look again at the XAML code the Visual Studio 2010 designer for WP7 Silverlight app had generating. I noticed the XAML had Background=”Black” at various controls (like Grid, Pivot etc.).
Comparing with a newly created project I noticed it just had Background=”Transparent” for Grid. I later on remembered that at some point it was showing Pivot pages one over the other (due to wrong nesting in the XAML) which had set me changing the Background to “Black” at various controls trying to work around the overlap issue.
Doing a replace all for { Background=”Black”} (with a space prefix) and replacing with {} (that is nothing) is the first step needed for the fix.
The 2nd step is to add to the XAML header the missing Background="{StaticResource PhoneBackgroundBrush}" attribute value assignment shown below in bold that seems to be missing (to use the phone’s background brush by default).
In fact most probably the 2nd issue is with the Silverlight WP7 Pivot application template (probably the same goes for the Panorama template) and not the XAML designer itself which may be WP7 agnostic altogether.
<phone:PhoneApplicationPage
x:Class="MYPHONEAPPCLASSNAME.MainPage"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
xmlns:phone="clr-namespace:Microsoft.Phone.Controls;assembly=Microsoft.Phone"
xmlns:shell="clr-namespace:Microsoft.Phone.Shell;assembly=Microsoft.Phone"
xmlns:controls="clr-namespace:Microsoft.Phone.Controls;assembly=Microsoft.Phone.Controls"
xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008"
xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006"
mc:Ignorable="d" d:DesignWidth="480" d:DesignHeight="768"
FontFamily="{StaticResource PhoneFontFamilyNormal}"
FontSize="{StaticResource PhoneFontSizeNormal}"
Foreground="{StaticResource PhoneForegroundBrush}"
Background="{StaticResource PhoneBackgroundBrush}"
SupportedOrientations="PortraitOrLandscape"
Orientation="Portrait"
shell:SystemTray.IsVisible="True"
Title="MYPHONEAPPTITLE"
IsHitTestVisible="True">
A useful link regarding WP7 brushes is “Theme Resources for Windows Phone”:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff769552(v=vs.92).aspx
These suggestions have been submitted to Microsoft Connect and can be voted for at: https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/703467/vs2010-silverlight-xaml-designer-with-wp7-silverlight-app-templates-fail-at-wp7-light-theme
