Web Setup project dependency bug in Visual Studio IDE
Arrgh! Perhaps the most irritating project scenario I can imagine: Today is a "Build Day", so you're fired up to deploy your sweet new code... Hmm, I wonder if the client will buy us "Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ?". All I need to do is compile the latest code, label the code, deploy to staging, test, and deploy to prod; no sweat. WTF? What does "Unable to update the dependencies of the project. The dependencies for the object 'DataEngine.dll' cannot be determined" mean?!? I told my manager this would only take two hours! (TIP: Don't ever do that during builds, too much can go wrong.)
I hit this error this week doing our usually silky deployment process. At first go, this doesn't seem all that complicated, but trust me, this one went from trivial to annoying in a hurry. And I had to buy my own lunch. This error apparently occurs due to a bug within the Visual Studio IDE: setup project dependencies can be bugged up by checking them in to source control. Most people say rebuild the setup projects from scratch, but come on, there has to be a better way, right? Plus, the last time we rebuilt these, our custom actions were overwritten. There is just too much hassle involved in rebuilding from scratch for every build: directory creation, shortcuts, custom actions, registry settings, remembering every associated project that needs to be added, etc.. the risk is greater than the reward.
The issue has very little support out there, so I wanted to post a few fixes I read about, and their result. I'll post what fixed it for me, but I'm still searching for the all-encompassing solution. Maybe some of the fails below could fix your issue... Please post if you have ideas:
- Tried: Removing and re-adding setup projects: Result: fail
- Tried: Removing my database project and restarting VS: Result: fail
- Tried: Many, MANY, cleans and rebuilds of my solution: Result: fail
- Tried: Reinstall of VS Service Pack 1: Result: No immediate effect
- Tried: Remove and re-add of all project outputs and custom actions: Result: fail
- Tried: Opened the setup projects .vdproj file via Notepad, and removed references to offending project. Re-added my project outputs as usual using File Editor: Result: SUCCESS!
Good luck with this one, somebody post if you hear of a fix for the bug...