Intellisense blocking our machines

[Hendrik Schober]

Hi,

as of last Friday VC8's intellisense started to completely block
one CPU (our developer machines have two) without getting anywhere.
This is a 1.2MLOC solution with 28 projects.
We have already found
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/produ...edbackid=5b68ae70-03ea-47b6-84ea-d18cafc735ff
which mentions deleting NCB files as a workaround. That doesn't work
here. Then there's
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/produ...edbackid=71c179fb-d843-4b6a-bdde-72c9550a8a55
which mentions VS Hotfix 4082 which can be obtained from Product
Support.

So I went to support.microsoft.com, opted for email support, logged
into passport, picked "Visual Studio 2005" as the app I am using,
and meant to start describing my problem. However, first this web
page wants a product ID. But where do I get this from? (There are
instructions regarding this on the website, but they must have been
written for some other set of products, as they seem to not to apply
to VS2005.) I went to Help/About but didn't find anything which
passes for a Product ID.
(This is VS2005 Pro which I got from an MSDN subscription, in case
that's important.)

Darn, why does it always have to be so hard to report a bug and/or
get a fix?

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Bo Persson]

Hi,

as of last Friday VC8's intellisense started to completely block
one CPU (our developer machines have two) without getting anywhere.
This is a 1.2MLOC solution with 28 projects.
We have already found

http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/produ...edbackid=5b68ae70-03ea-47b6-84ea-d18cafc735ff
which mentions deleting NCB files as a workaround. That doesn't work
here. Then there's

http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/produ...edbackid=71c179fb-d843-4b6a-bdde-72c9550a8a55
which mentions VS Hotfix 4082 which can be obtained from Product
Support.

So I went to support.microsoft.com, opted for email support, logged
into passport, picked "Visual Studio 2005" as the app I am using,
and meant to start describing my problem. However, first this web
page wants a product ID. But where do I get this from? (There are
instructions regarding this on the website, but they must have been
written for some other set of products, as they seem to not to apply
to VS2005.) I went to Help/About but didn't find anything which
passes for a Product ID.
(This is VS2005 Pro which I got from an MSDN subscription, in case
that's important.)

Darn, why does it always have to be so hard to report a bug and/or
get a fix?

Schobi

It is mentioned here

http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=132651&SiteID=1&PageID=2

that one of the problems is with using typedefs to move global names
into a namespace, like

namespace myspace
{
typedef ::sometype sometype;
}

This kills IntelliSense!

On the other hand

namespace myspace
{
using ::sometype;
}

seems to work. At least it fixed a similar problem for me.


Bo Persson

 

[Bruno van Dooren]

as of last Friday VC8's intellisense started to completely block

one CPU (our developer machines have two) without getting anywhere.
This is a 1.2MLOC solution with 28 projects.

If Bo's suggestion does not work and you are blocked, you could always try
the visual assist plugin from http://www.wholetomato.com/
Several people on this forum are using it to solve their intellisense
problems.

To report / search for bugs online you can go here:
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/ProductFeedback/

Intellisense is like a box of chocolates. you never know what you are going
to get ;-)

--

Kind regards,
Bruno van Dooren
(e-mail address removed)
Remove only "_nos_pam"

 

[Carl Daniel [VC++ MVP]]

So I went to support.microsoft.com, opted for email support, logged
into passport, picked "Visual Studio 2005" as the app I am using,
and meant to start describing my problem. However, first this web
page wants a product ID. But where do I get this from? (There are
instructions regarding this on the website, but they must have been
written for some other set of products, as they seem to not to apply
to VS2005.) I went to Help/About but didn't find anything which
passes for a Product ID.
(This is VS2005 Pro which I got from an MSDN subscription, in case
that's important.)

The product ID's are listed in the listbox that's embedded in the Help|About
for VS2005 (and 2003 and 2002, IIRC). It should look something like:

Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 #####-###-#######-#####

I'm looking at VS2005 Team Suite, but I believe the About box in Pro should
look the same - just with fewer installed options showing.

.... or do you mean that you tried the product IDs there and none of them
worked? If so, I'd call PSS.

-cd

 

[Hendrik Schober]

[...]
It is mentioned here

http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=132651&SiteID=1&PageID=2

that one of the problems is with using typedefs to move global names
into a namespace, like

namespace myspace
{
typedef ::sometype sometype;
}

This kills IntelliSense!

On the other hand

namespace myspace
{
using ::sometype;
}

seems to work. At least it fixed a similar problem for me.

Nice find, but we're not going to go through 1.2MLOC (1/3
of which isn't even our own) to find such code and change
it. (We'd have to defer shipping for that.) And it's not
even sure it will fix the problem!
I think we'd rather go back to using VS2003.

Bo Persson

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Hendrik Schober]

If Bo's suggestion does not work and you are blocked, you could always try
the visual assist plugin from http://www.wholetomato.com/
Several people on this forum are using it to solve their intellisense
problems.

We all use it and are happy about it. Definitly recommended.
But I don't see how it could help here.

To report / search for bugs online you can go here:
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/ProductFeedback/

It's already reported twice at least. I need a /fix/ ASAP.

[...]

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Hendrik Schober]

The product ID's are listed in the listbox that's embedded in the Help|About
for VS2005 (and 2003 and 2002, IIRC). It should look something like:

Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 #####-###-#######-#####

I'm looking at VS2005 Team Suite, but I believe the About box in Pro should
look the same - just with fewer installed options showing.

I was afraid that would be the case. I already tried this
often enough to by now knowing it by heart. Doesn't work.
(Translated from German which that website insists to use
with me: "The Product ID you entered is for and not for
Visual Studio Professional..." Yes, there's a noun missing.
No, I didn't forget is. That's what that website tells me.)

... or do you mean that you tried the product IDs there and none of them
worked? If so, I'd call PSS.

You mean "call" as in "phone"? Ah, the joy of trying to
get a telephone support person to get me somone who will
actually understand what I am talking about... I really,
really, really tried to avoid that!

<rant>
I am really, really, really <censored> off about this
"Support". I feel like my mum if she would ever try to
report a bug, not like a developer who's used to /give/
support to users.

-cd

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Bruno van Dooren]

If Bo's suggestion does not work and you are blocked, you could always

We all use it and are happy about it. Definitly recommended.
But I don't see how it could help here.

I thought it replaced the original intellisense. seems I was wrong.
I have never used it. hence my mistake.

did you see this btw:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms235519(VS.80).aspx
don't know if it will help, but I just stumbled across it.
the only other option would be to disable intellisense, but I don't know it
it disables it completely, or only the statement completion part.

--

Kind regards,
Bruno van Dooren
(e-mail address removed)
Remove only "_nos_pam"

 

[Hendrik Schober]

[...]
did you see this btw:
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms235519(VS.80).aspx
don't know if it will help, but I just stumbled across it.
the only other option would be to disable intellisense, but I don't know it
it disables it completely, or only the statement completion part.

No, I hadn't seen this.
However, it doesn't help either. In case it doesn't help,
it refers to PSS. Back to square one...

<sigh>

I might just have to make that call.
Which is really stupid. I bet that email support is quite
a bit cheaper for MS...

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Guest]

We all use it and are happy about it. Definitly recommended.
But I don't see how it could help here.

Go into the Visual Assist options, and in the Listboxes section, make sure
the box "Get content from default Intellisense" is unchecked. As the Whole
Tomato marketing gods have given me to believe, this will shut off the C++
Intellisense and cause Visual Assist to use only its own parsers, resulting
in IDE performance increases and other goodness.

It seems to work for me, although the largest solution I deal with is "only"
400K LOC.

Sean

 

[Hendrik Schober]

Go into the Visual Assist options, and in the Listboxes section, make sure
the box "Get content from default Intellisense" is unchecked. As the Whole
Tomato marketing gods have given me to believe, this will shut off the C++
Intellisense and cause Visual Assist to use only its own parsers, resulting
in IDE performance increases and other goodness.

It seems to work for me, although the largest solution I deal with is "only"
400K LOC.

Thanks, I've tried that. I've also gone through the options
and disabled anything looking like it might use Intellisense.
Doesn't help here.

Sean

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Hendrik Schober]

Hi,

as of last Friday VC8's intellisense started to completely block
one CPU (our developer machines have two) without getting anywhere.
This is a 1.2MLOC solution with 28 projects.
We have already found
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/produ...edbackid=5b68ae70-03ea-47b6-84ea-d18cafc735ff
which mentions deleting NCB files as a workaround. That doesn't work
here. Then there's
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/produ...edbackid=71c179fb-d843-4b6a-bdde-72c9550a8a55
which mentions VS Hotfix 4082 which can be obtained from Product
Support.

So I went to support.microsoft.com, opted for email support, logged
into passport, picked "Visual Studio 2005" as the app I am using,
and meant to start describing my problem. However, first this web
page wants a product ID. But where do I get this from? (There are
instructions regarding this on the website, but they must have been
written for some other set of products, as they seem to not to apply
to VS2005.) I went to Help/About but didn't find anything which
passes for a Product ID.
(This is VS2005 Pro which I got from an MSDN subscription, in case
that's important.)

Darn, why does it always have to be so hard to report a bug and/or
get a fix?

As the product IDs I tried (those of mine and my co-worker's
installations) didn't work, I finally called PSS as Carl did
suggest.
<sigh>
It was just as I had expected. The guy on the phone wanted a
KB ID for the hotfix, otherwise he couldn't get it. He seemed
to have never heard of the lab.msdn.microsoft.com site. I sent
him to it and pointed out the answer mentioning the hotfix.
Then I had a lot of time listening to music until he got back
to me telling me the way to get the hotfix is to add a comment
to the bug details. I voiced my concerns whether this would
be helpful, but in the end I gave in and tried.
Now we sit here and wait for someone to actually read the
comment, digest it, respond, and send us the fix. All this
while VS is blocking one out of two CPUs and can't be closed,
but must be shot via the task manager. This is rather pathetic.

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Carl Daniel [VC++ MVP]]

Now we sit here and wait for someone to actually read the
comment, digest it, respond, and send us the fix. All this
while VS is blocking one out of two CPUs and can't be closed,
but must be shot via the task manager. This is rather pathetic.

I've asked that someone on the VC++ team look into this - hopefully they'll
be able to locate the ellusive KB article number.

In the meantime, you can delete/rename feacp.dll in the ../bin directory to
disable intellisense for C++ - that might be better than having your CPU
spinning all the time.

-cd

 

[Guest]

I've asked that someone on the VC++ team look into this - hopefully they'll
be able to locate the ellusive KB article number.

In the meantime, you can delete/rename feacp.dll in the ../bin directory to
disable intellisense for C++ - that might be better than having your CPU
spinning all the time.

-cd

Carl brought this to our attention,

First of all, we should certainly apologize for the confusion with regards
to getting product support to provide you with the hotfix in question. While
all these hotfix numbers alias something unique, we often don't realize that
support does not use the same alias as the product team. In any case, there
are two hotfixes that address the issues that have been brought up in this
thread.

One if VS QFE 3991 (bug causing infinite parsing due to some typedef code)
and the other is QFE 4082 (lowering thread priority of Intellisense). The KB
numbers for these hotfixes are 913377 and 916769 respectively. These KB
numbers should be sufficient for product support to give you these fixes.

Once again, our apologies for the difficulties and we hope these fixes will
be useful. If they are not, please log bugs at our product feedback center
indicating these hotfixes were insufficient and outlining something we can
reproduce on our end.

Thanks,

 

[Carl Daniel [VC++ MVP]]

Hi,

Did you get the two hotfixes? Did they help?

-cd

 

[Hendrik Schober]

Thanks. Some of us already did this.

Carl brought this to our attention,

Yes. As always, Carl has been very helpful. Thanks, Carl!

First of all, we should certainly apologize for the confusion with regards
to getting product support to provide you with the hotfix in question. While
all these hotfix numbers alias something unique, we often don't realize that
support does not use the same alias as the product team.

I don't think there's a need for you to apologize for
some German support departement. I don't even want to
blame them. It's just that somehow I knew that calling
support would be a waste of time. -- WHich is why I
posted here.

In any case, there
are two hotfixes that address the issues that have been brought up in this
thread.

One if VS QFE 3991 (bug causing infinite parsing due to some typedef code)
and the other is QFE 4082 (lowering thread priority of Intellisense). The KB
numbers for these hotfixes are 913377 and 916769 respectively. These KB
numbers should be sufficient for product support to give you these fixes.

Once again, our apologies for the difficulties and we hope these fixes will
be useful. If they are not, please log bugs at our product feedback center
indicating these hotfixes were insufficient and outlining something we can
reproduce on our end.

Thanks.
I called support again and, providing the KB numbers,
this time I hopefully will get those hotfixes. Let's
see if they help.

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Hendrik Schober]

Did you get the two hotfixes? Did they help?

Hi Carl,

Sorry for the delay. Thu was a holiday here, and I had
Wed and Fri off.

Thanks to your and Boris' help I have been able to make
some progress. I got the hotfix mentioned in KB913377
(bug causing infinite parsing due to some typedef code).
Unfortunately /this hotfix does not help/. I still get
the "Updating Intellisense..." message in the status bar
and the progress bar gets stuck at 3 LEDs.
The hotfix from KB916769, which I am still waiting for,
lowers the priority of the Intellisense thread. While it
might give some relieve, I don't see how it can fix the
underlying problem that Intellisense parses endlessly.
(We have already found that it doesn't finish even over
night.)

<sigh>

We might have to give up on Intellisense altogether.

-cd

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Hendrik Schober]

[...]
Once again, our apologies for the difficulties and we hope these fixes will
be useful. If they are not, please log bugs at our product feedback center
indicating these hotfixes were insufficient and outlining something we can
reproduce on our end.

Boris,

I have installed both hotfixes and they do not help.
I have logged a new bug as you suggested:
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/Produ...edbackId=b0eafdde-a115-4466-b19e-c0f068cb1b28

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis

 

[Carl Daniel [VC++ MVP]]

Hi Carl,

Sorry for the delay. Thu was a holiday here, and I had
Wed and Fri off.

Thanks to your and Boris' help I have been able to make
some progress. I got the hotfix mentioned in KB913377
(bug causing infinite parsing due to some typedef code).
Unfortunately /this hotfix does not help/. I still get
the "Updating Intellisense..." message in the status bar
and the progress bar gets stuck at 3 LEDs.
The hotfix from KB916769, which I am still waiting for,
lowers the priority of the Intellisense thread. While it
might give some relieve, I don't see how it can fix the
underlying problem that Intellisense parses endlessly.
(We have already found that it doesn't finish even over
night.)

<sigh>

We might have to give up on Intellisense altogether.

Sorry it didn't fix the problems you're seeing - sounds like there's still
another infintie parse bug in feacp. Intellisense has come a long way, but
it's still just not quite there, unfortunately.

-cd

 

[Hendrik Schober]

Did you get the two hotfixes? Did they help?

[...]
I got the hotfix mentioned in KB913377
(bug causing infinite parsing due to some typedef code).
Unfortunately /this hotfix does not help/. I still get
the "Updating Intellisense..." message in the status bar
and the progress bar gets stuck at 3 LEDs.
The hotfix from KB916769, which I am still waiting for,
lowers the priority of the Intellisense thread. While it
might give some relieve, I don't see how it can fix the
underlying problem that Intellisense parses endlessly.
(We have already found that it doesn't finish even over
night.)

[...]

Sorry it didn't fix the problems you're seeing - sounds like there's still
another infintie parse bug in feacp.

I got some news regarding this.
Since this only started a while ago, and since working
without Intellisense is a PITA once you're used to it,
we had someone find the specific checkin causing this
using binary approximation. It took a whole day, but
turned out to be a 'typedef' issue that obviously was
/not/ fixed by the KB913377 hotfix (which I understood
to adress such an issue). We changed the code and now
it again works. Until someone again checks in something
that trips it up...
We're trying to find the time to boil the code down to
a repro sample. If we succeed, I'll add it to the bug
http://lab.msdn.microsoft.com/Produ...edbackId=b0eafdde-a115-4466-b19e-c0f068cb1b28
that I reported. However, I suppose it will be rather
hard to do that. We have a lot of similar 'typedef's
in our code which do not cause Intellisense to fail.
So it must be something really special about this one
that might be hard to capture.

Intellisense has come a long way, but
it's still just not quite there, unfortunately.

Maybe. We had, unfortunately, just a few days to use
it, then it blew up. So I can't comment on this.

-cd

Schobi

--
(e-mail address removed) is never read
I'm Schobi at suespammers dot org

"The sarcasm is mightier than the sword."
Eric Jarvis