VS 2005 Debugger crashing with IE 8 Beta 2

Question

Dear Friends,

Today I installed IE 8 Beta 2 and started debugging my ASP.NET 2.0 site on VS 2005. When I start debugger it automatically stops after IE window appears on screen. My question is that do I need to do something with IE8 Beta2 settings to enable debugging in my ASP.NET applications or some thing is going wrong with IE8 Beta2 ?

When I try to debug my applications with IE7 then VS 2005 debugger is working fine. My operating system is windows 2003 server

To replicate this issue, I am adding steps:

1. Open ASP.NET 2.0 site on visual studio 2005
2. Close all IE windows
3. Start debugging, it should work fine
4. Now stop debugging and open IE
5. Now again start debugging or press F5 in VS 2005
6. Notice that VS 2005 debugger will not start

Any suggestions or ideas will be most welcome.

Thanks and Regards,

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Haider Raza Software Engineer, ZABSolutions. MCP(C#)

Answer 1

Hi,

IE 8 has a feature called Loosely-Coupled Internet Explorer (LCIE) which results in IE running across multiple processes.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/beta/readiness/developers-existing.aspx#lcie

Older versions of the Visual Studio Debugger get confused by this and cannot figure out how to attach to the correct process.  You can work around this by disabling the process growth feature of LCIE.  Here's how:

1)  Open RegEdit
2)  Browse to HKEY_LOCALMACHINE -> SOFTWARE -> Microsoft -> Internet Explorer -> Main
3)  Add a dword under this key called TabProcGrowth
4)  Set TabProcGrowth to 0

Since you are running on Windows Server 2003, this is all you should need to do.  If you run into the same problem on Vista or newer, you will also need to turn off protected mode.

Thanks.

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Brad Sullivan - Program Manager - Visual Studio Debugger

Answer 2

Thank you Brad.

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Haider Raza Software Engineer, ZABSolutions. MCP(C#)

Answer 3

Hi Brad,

Thanks for this information, I ran into exactly the same problem after installing IE 8 this week. If I manually attached the process during debugging everything worked fine, but it wouldn't do it on its own, which was a real pain.

This fix worked for me, and I am running Windows XP Pro.

Mike

Answer 4

In Windows 7, there is already a REG_SZ type "TabProcGrowth" value there. By default its value is Medium.
What's proper value for it ?

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Morgan

Answer 5

Brad
Thanks for the solution
Still i am unable to solve the problem
I added the key at your described location
Then i attach the process aspnet_wp.exe by going to tools
But unable to get the debuging

Answer 6

Hi Brad,

I recently posted this: http://forums.asp.net/p/1412558/3101843.aspx#3101843

Does what you posted apply to my situation too?  Also, if I upgrade to VS2008 will this problem disappear?

Robert

Answer 7

Thanks Brad
It Worked.

Answer 8

Hi Brad

I just today installed IE8, and am now unable to debug my simple web silverlight project.

I tried the regedit hack above, which changed the behavior (now the running VS2008 debugger *also* appears in the window) but didnt fix it.

I also unchecked and re-checked the web / properties / web / debug Silverlight checkbox with no change.

any other ideas?

thanx

r

Answer 9

Thank You,Brad!!!

Answer 10

hi!

thanks brad! i was just pulling my hair what's causing the problem for not going my application in Debug Mode (Visual Studio 2005) or not stopping at defined breakpoints. your trick has just worked perfect for my problem. never imagined to resolve so easliy. am using vs2005 on windows xp pro.

the reason am writing here today just to make a better analysis of the problem. before reading your post, i tried on firefox instead of IE. but the compiler didn't stop at the breakpoints. i dont know what's causing the problem with firefox. however, after after the key in the registry, it stop at breakpoints also with firefox.

may be my problem also related to the Visual Web Developer Express Edition which i downloaded from microsoft website a week ago. since then whenever i run my application, a new process "WebDev.WebServer.exe" starts up automatically which was never seen before. and constantly an error popups very often saying "An Error Verified in WebDev.WebServer.exe. The Application will be closed".

it would be greatful, perhaps very kind if you can shed some light on this sequence of events for my better programming skills in the future.

thanks once again.

rams

Answer 11

Thanks, Brad!!

I was on the verge of "uninstall, reinstall, see if that clears it up" and found your post.

Whew!

Worked like a charm!

Windows XP Pro
Visual Studio 2005
ASP.NET/C#
http://www.myschoolvalet.com

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Remove filler from email address

Answer 12

Hi Brad,

Thanks for the help,

I tried it in Windows XP and it is working great ....... .

Thanks for the solution.

Answer 13

This fix worked for Visual Studio 2003 as well.