Addin problem - "invalid class string"

[Paul]

Help, please, I can't get any addins working on a new machine. I registered
the correct plugin names into the right registry location. I gave
VSControlHostLib with a strong name, created the interop assembly, put them
both in the GAC. On my main development machine plugins work OK. On this new
machine no plugins work (not even the ToolWindow example). I keep getting
this error message when invoking EnvDTE.Windows.CreateToolWindow:

System.Interop.RunTimeServices.COMException (0x800401F3): Invalid Class
String.

If someone could help me get this up and running before noon I would be very
grateful.

Thanks,
Paul

 

[Carlos J. Quintero [.NET MVP]]

Hi,

I assume that the host (target) of your add-in is VS.NET (not an Office
product) and that you are using a shim control (because you can call
CreateToolwindow without the shim control in VS.NET 2002 and even in VS.NET
2003 with a hack).

The shim control, provided by MS or other versions out there, needs to be
re-ProgID and re-GUID to avoid collisions with shim controls of other
products. Have you done that? See

http://groups.google.es/group/micro...Uintero+re-GUID&rnum=1&hl=es#b60741c50a665b2e

That said, the shim control, being an ActiveX (COM) control, must be
registered with regsvr32.exe or similar. Have you done this on the client
machines?

Finally, why are you deploying it to the GAC? There is no need for that,
unless you are sharing it with other apps.

--
Best regards,

Carlos J. Quintero

MZ-Tools: Productivity add-ins for Visual Studio .NET, VB6, VB5 and VBA
You can code, design and document much faster.
Free resources for add-in developers:
http://www.mztools.com

 

[Paul]

regsvr32.exe did it you were right yes yes yes

Wohoo! Pulled out of the fire!

Thanks!

Paul

 

[Carlos J. Quintero [.NET MVP]]

Well, then you can re-ProgID and re-GUID now. Be aware if you don´t do it
and another add-in developer does the same, your add-in could end using the
shim control of the another add-in if it was registered after yours, or even
worse, it could break your add-in if it is uninstalled.

BTW, the microsoft.public.vsnet.ide newsgroup is better than this for add-in
questions, and the Yahoo forum (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vsnetaddin/)
even better.

--
Best regards,

Carlos J. Quintero

MZ-Tools: Productivity add-ins for Visual Studio .NET, VB6, VB5 and VBA
You can code, design and document much faster.
Free resources for add-in developers:
http://www.mztools.com