Despite multiple tries the installer fails to install any templates in Visual Studio 2022. Initially I had all platforms selected and then tried just Oxygene.
I have installed and uninstalled and reinstalled and it always fails.
I tried loading a VS 2019 project in 2022 but it shows as incompatible.
This is with the latest, presumably, trial version.
This is a bit disappointing as I wanted to use the trial period to evaluate a possibly desirable product. Now I presume the trial period has started but I can’t use it.
Hi Michael,
[quote=“mickwaterhouse, post:1, topic:31615, full:true”]
Despite multiple tries the installer fails to install any templates in Visual Studio 2022. Initially I had all platforms selected and then tried just Oxygene.
I have installed and uninstalled and reinstalled and it always fails.
I tried loading a VS 2019 project in 2022 but it shows as incompatible.
This is with the latest, presumably, trial version.
This is a bit disappointing as I wanted to use the trial period to evaluate a possibly desirable [/quote]
my apologies for this, this is strange, and not a known issue. What exact version of VS2022 do you have installed? Iirc there was a building a could weeks back where (this was a bug from Microsoft) Visual Studio would hang/crash when running the command that updates its templates (devenv.exe /setup).
Could you (a) make sure yu have updated to the most recent build of VS, just in case and (b) run devenv.exe /setup manually on the command line? (you find devenv.exe in the Common7\IDE folder of the VS install).
Once again, my sincerest apologies for this bad initial experience.
No worries, the trial does not start until you create or open tour first project; that said we can also always send you a trial extension later, if needed.
Please let me know if the above helped, and if not we can see what next steps to take…
thanx!
marc
Thanks for the reply marc, I updated my issue a little and tried to email you but it didn’t go through. I decided to ignore the VS 2022 is for the moment and went to try in VS 2019 and Water but am now getting a license expired notice. That says ‘Trial period for Oxygene for .NET has ended’.
The same with other project types like ‘island’, the trial period has ended.
Maybe too many reinstalls. But it has only been two days if that.
I have updated both My VS Community 2022 17.13.6 and VS Community Preview 17.14.0 and manually run devenv.exe /setup but no different.
Regard Michael
No worries – I’ve sent you a trial extension via PM, at least that should unlock you for Water. Do yu have the templates OK in VS2019 as well?
I’ll check with th rest of the team tomorrow as to what we can check for next steps on the VS2022 issue.
thanx,
marc
Hi marc, thanks for the trial extension. I do have the templates in VS2019 and also 2017
I didn’t mention this initially but when I installed for 2022 the installer seized up right at the last. I waited a fair time and checked Task manager for activity but was finished so I ended it. Waiting time well over ten minutes.
After ending the installer manually the templates were in all but VS 2022
I haven’t tried a fresh reinstall after updating 2022 I just tried devenv.exe /update manually. Which didn’t change anything.
I’m busy today, holiday here, but if you think it is worth running the installer again I obviously can do that.
Many regards, Michael.
Okay. that was the bug in Microsofts VS2022 update from a few weeks ago that I was referring to. I wonder if that F’ed up something for good.
@elenap can you help Mick to review what could be wrong or clean up what might be causing issues, here?
Ahh you might wanna try that, yeah. 
—marc
Thanks marc, I have come back after a day away from the computer and when I started it up and checked VS 2022 preview lo and behold the templates were there. Oddly not in the standard VS 2022.
I reran the installer and this time it did complete but still no templates in the standard 2022. I tried opening the solution generated by VS 2022 preview but it was incompatible.
All that being said I happy to take from here using Water and the preview VS2022 version. Maybe the other VS2022 will sort itself out, but it doesn’t matter.
I am really happy to be trying out a good Object Pascal language in a decent editor/ide and we should be right from now on.
Thanks very much for the support,
Regards Michael
You have two installed side by side? I didn’t know that was possible.
Maybe we have n issue with how we register these, for when two versions are installed. Not sure that is a scenario we ever tested. I’ll have the team look into that – in the mean time, are you good with what you have?
I assume once you created a project, it opens ok in VS2022 Standard?
Happy to hear that!
—marc
You can have the two versions side by side no worries. Initially the Standard version would not load even a project generated by VS 2022 preview but this morning it loads projects just fine. I am good to go from this point.
One other question while I have you, I haven’t explored the documentation fully yet but as I was poking and prodding Visual Studio I tried F1 to see what help would pop up. I only got a small empty window with no info in it. Launching help from Water fires up a page with plenty of info.
Is there a way to get to the help pages from Visual Studio?
I just did an experiment with VS standard by loading a project generated by VS preview and the selecting ‘Add: New item’. That seems to trigger rescan of the project’s directories or something because then there were all templates available.
When I first tried that it would not even load the project flagging it as incompatible, then after a rest it decided it would load a solution but no templates appeared and then using the last-mentioned method which I saw on this site somewhere, it did generate the templates.
So even better good to go now.
regards Michael
. Either way, I;;ll log a ticket and we can see if we can (a) reproduce and (b) do anything about this issue.
Hmm, good question. I think VS only has its own “Help”, without support for integrating Third Party content, but something worth for us to investigate, yes.
Interesting! did they stay available indefinitely after that, including New pproject ones?
If so, this sounds even more like something got messed up with VS’s template database when defend /setup hung in that bad version…
That’s the important part!
Yep they have stayed permanently. Two questions before I explore all myself. Can the syntax highlighting be tuned to be the same as VS C# especially getting Types to be separate and is there detailed documentation for Island. I was poking around there to test an edge case error I found in Delphi and discovered some quirks in the WriteLine parameters. I presume there are other quirks. Actually the quirks in this case were in C#.
Regards Michael.
I don’t use VS myself much, but I thought we have that? I’ll check with the team. We do not have this in Fire/Water, for performance reasons (The Fire/Water editor is purposely designed to be super-lightweight, like the rest of the IDE, and has no access to the logical code model during the syntax highlighting phase.
All documentation we currently have is on our docs site, for island in particular at Platforms and "Island" Compiler Back-end. Is there anything in particular that you find missing? If so, please let me k w and I’ll see how we cna expand the documentation on those topics…
What quirks were those? I’d love to know so we can see if we can sort them out. One thkngni do know we’re (somewhat purposely) missing is the “:” formatting syntax in writeLn for formatting; writeLn() follows a regular function call syntax on Oxygene (and the other languages, of course) with no special compiler magic syntax. String.Format() or strings with inline expressions are the preferred way for handling that.
thanx,
marc
I would like some more info on Syntax highlighting in Visual Studio. There is some but not as much as Microsoft standard. I have had a look in the Fonts Colors in settings of course but couldn’t see how to vary some individual elements that is in C# for example. Microsoft version. If anyone does know in some detail I am keen to know.
As for the quirks I mention, you mostly answered with the formatting variations and String.Format(). I think I tried just Format().
The specific thing I found was that the comma separator Writeln(varA, VarB) didn’t work but the + separator/concatenator Writeln(varA + VarB) did.
So probably not much of a quirk after all.
I see more of the documentation now, thanks for the pointers. I think I have enough to keep me busy exploring for a while.
Thanks, Michael
Yeah, the is an as-designed language difference; in Oxygene, writeLn() (and all “Compiler Magic Functions”) are treated as regular functions syntax wise; in case of writeLn, it accepts one (optional) parameter, the string/object to print. I suppose we could add an overload to accept more than one parameter.
See System Functions for all of them.
How does Delphi emit Writeln(varA, VarB), does it just emit them with one after the other, no spacing?
Cool!
In Delphi it expresses them as is, no spaces, hence Writeln(varA, ’ ', varB); if a space is needed. Also, the parameters can include specifications of a field width and a number of decimal places.
I asked a general question under the ‘visual studio heading’, about detailed syntax highlighting in Visual Studio but didn’t get an answer. Maybe nobody knows or cares, but I really like Visual Studio and a detailed syntax highlighting but I can’t see how to change anything except one item Oxygene internal types’.
Regards Michael
Hm, i thought I had answered that. I believe we dop have a bit more details type highlighting in Visual Studio, but I need to check (I don’t work in VS much, myself). Fire and Water deliberately do not highlight types in favor for performance and lightweightness. The syntax highlighter does not have access to the ode model to know wha is a type, in exchange it can do highlighting for like a million lines, in a split-second.
Yeah you did partly answer that question before but were not sure about VS which does offer a ‘bit’ more syntax highlighting but doesn’t offer either the same level and detail as Microsoft does, or any means to vary things except that one. I just wanted to clarify whether or not it does. Apparently not.
I understand the reasoning behind that choice in your own editor, which is quite nice to use also, but when I initially saw that Oxygene ‘fully’ integrates with VS I was hoping for something like the level that VS offers with it’s own languages.
I won’t be writing a million lines of code anytime soon and the enhanced readability, for me, of comprehensive syntax highlighting and other enhancements that Visual Studio can offer, is a significant feature.
But, I quite like Pascal and especially Oxygene’s enhancements so far so I am still keen to keep trying it.
I’d be happy to have tat looked into. What level of extra details in highlighting does VC# provide you that Oxygene currently does not – assuming that we do (and I do think we do?) highlight types differently than other identifiers?
Happy to hear that!
VC# can will highlight method names and variables, probably more but those are good. And of course the type highlighting whether built in or user types. In Oxygene some type highlighting, in the same teal green color happens but not consistently. A user type in the declaration is unhighlighted but then can show highlighted in a user defined color in defining a class method when qualifying with the class name, but writing the same class name between begin end in the main program doesn’t have any highlighting. System classes like ‘Console’ don’t show highlighting but string and integer and the like do. Or File and Folder classes or DirectoryInfo and the like do not have highlighting. It is a bit hard to describe completely. Perhaps a visual side by side would be better.
Regards Michael
Hi Marc any further thoughts on the Syntax highlighting issues I mentioned.
I have been spending time exploring different aspects of the the product mostly Oxygene for Island and .Net. Like many I learned procedural Pascal at Uni and am interested to see what it can become. Plenty of stuff to keep me interested for quite a while. Good job on a great product
Regards Michael.