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I'm trying to get edit-and-continue working with Visual Studio 2008 with an ASP.Net MVC project. I'm running 64-bit, so that adds to the problem.

In Configuration Manager, my active solution platform is x86 and all the projects are targeting Debug x86 as well.

In the project properties I have "Enable Edit and Continue" selected.

In Tools->Options...->Debugging->Edit and continue I have "Enable Edit and Continue" selected.

In Tools->Options...->Debugging->General I have "Break all processes when one project breaks" enabled.

As soon as I try to change some source code outside of a view/template'I get the message: Edit and continue: Changes are not allowed while code is running or if the option 'Break all processes when one project breaks' is dissabled. The option can be enabled in Tools, Options, Debugging.

Any ideas how to get it to work?

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Does this happen with all your projects, or just one of them? Does it happen when you try and run your project on another machine? –  Richie Cotton Jul 10 '09 at 12:47
Richie, it happens with all my projects. I don't have another machine to try on. –  Pablo Jul 14 '09 at 5:34
The whole Edit & Continue process in VS is badly done, VS should not let you have conflicting settings. Also the fact that settings are scattered depending on language and project type, requiring 32bit builds just makes it worse. –  eschneider Jul 15 '09 at 23:34
Similar question: stackoverflow.com/q/5672961/758666 –  wil Oct 29 '13 at 2:18

5 Answers 5

up vote 12 down vote accepted

Do you have Enable Optimizations checked? (Advanced Compile Options), I don't think you can have that checked...

Also: http://blogs.msdn.com/webdevelopertips/archive/2008/11/26/tip-29-did-you-know-how-to-enable-edit-and-continue-feature-for-web-application-projects.aspx

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[also unmanaged code and SQL must be disabled] –  eschneider Jul 10 '09 at 15:39
Where's this Advanced Compile Options? What do you mean by disabling unmanaged code an SQL? –  Pablo Jul 12 '09 at 13:49
in C# projects: Project Settings Build / Optimize code [uncheck] Debug / Enable Debuggers / Enable SQL Server Debugging, Enable unmanaged code debugging [uncheck both] –  eschneider Jul 13 '09 at 14:01
eschneider, do you mean project properties? –  Pablo Jul 14 '09 at 5:44
yes, the project settings. They are a bit different for C# vs VB.NET –  eschneider Jul 14 '09 at 6:58

For VS2010 try this

alt text

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You can't 'edit and continue' when the program is running. You must break to edit and continue, and if you have many threads you must break all. If when breaking, some threads continue to run, it not a problem with 'edit and continue' but a problem with the break options.

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If I have to stop the program, then what's the use? it's already stopped! If I understand correctly, using ASP.Net you can just modify code and it gets recompiled on-demand, am I wrong? –  Pablo Jul 15 '09 at 5:40
You have to be in Break Mode –  eschneider Jul 15 '09 at 5:51
You don't need to stop the program, but you must break, and then you can continue. It makes sense, you can't change a program while it's running, it's like fixing the road while cars are driving on it. You can pase the program or add a breakpoint before the area you want to edit, and then when the breakpoint is reached you can edit and continue. it's called 'edit and continue' which meens you are paused now, not 'edit while running'... Good luck –  Clangon Jul 15 '09 at 7:20
You can change an ASP.Net program while is running, am I wrong? You can also change a PHP program, but that's not fair. You can do hot loading of code in Java and in Erlang it's fantastic. But at any rate, even if I'm paused, I'm not allowed to change any code. –  Pablo Jul 16 '09 at 5:25
Is break all processes when one process breaks on? if so you should be able to edit when you break, or at least get a different error message. –  Clangon Jul 16 '09 at 9:24

Are you using IIS or the built in Visual Studio development server for debugging? I've had trouble before getting edit and continue running under IIS, and ended up just using the built in server.

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I'm not using IIS in this case, but the built-in one. –  Pablo Jul 12 '09 at 13:45

I open a separate browser window (so it doesn't close when I stop debugging) then I stop debugging, make changes and build them and just carry on using the other browser window to view the changes. (Yes - this works even with changes in your class files, controllers etc).

If you just want to change the views, CSS or scripts you just need to shift and refresh to make sure your browser gets the updated files rather than using the cache.

If this sounds odd to anyone - try it! It works!

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