[sldev] Re: Making symbol browsing work across projects in VS

[Carsten Juttner]

Dale Mahalko wrote:
> 1. Don't try to edit the source by opening a single *.vcproj file vs
> opening the entire "indra_complete.sln".
>
> 2. While you can certainly open individual project files and edit them
> that way, if the all the projects aren't loaded together as part of a
> single solution then symbol browsing doesn't work across all the
> projects and Visual Studio can't tell you what is wrong or how to fix
> it..
>   

Yes, true, VS thinks in solutions, if you open up a vcproj and try to 
save, VS usually automatically creates a new solution for it and if one 
already exists, it offers to open up that one.

The symbol browsing (also known as "Intellisense") is actually one of 
the most useful and at the same time most annoying features of VS. 
Given, parsing C++ source code is hard enough, trying to do so while you 
are editing them is probably even harder. But still...

So don't wonder if it suddenly fails to work in mysterious ways. This is 
ok, it just does that. Often it's because you created an unparsable 
temporary construction (like not adding a "{" or "(") but sometimes it 
simply stops working for a while. Don't worry though, after compiling 
and/or changing source files it will return.

Another thing is that it usually starts to parse your source files right 
when you don't want it to (because it causes your whole system to slow 
down even on fast systems. If you spot a "feacp" in the task manager 
draining lots of CPU time, that's the Intellisense parser).

Don't get me wrong, If it works, it's great indeed.

PS: If all things fail, you can try deleting the .ncb file (no compile 
browse). It will be regenerated. Sometimes it seems necessary though I 
didn't have to do it for a long time now.


Regards,
Carsten