Disappearing Tools

JEofVA

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Joined
May 21, 2009
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Programming Experience
1-3
I hope this is the correct forum for my question, which is....

Why would the tool box suddenly be empty? And, where have all the tools gone?

Here's the background:

I had my version of VS 2008 Express on an older laptop that I was using for a standalone project I was building in my spare time (I'm new to VB). I had just finished the main piece, and was about to start working on both expanding its capabilities, as well as developing some auxillary programs that were designed to process the data that the first project created, when the laptop started showing signs of rapid decay. Everything was backed up, so I bought a new laptop and reloaded it with all the data from the first, including reinstalling VS 2008 Express.

For the first few weeks everything seemed to be okay, but then I noticed that some of the Database routines in the Toolbox where missing when I tried to use them in a new project. Notably, OleDBConnection object and a few others weren't in the list. I tinkered around with trying to get them back by going into the Tools => Choose Toolbox Items... dialog, but that didn't seem to help.

Now, after a 2 week hiatus, I find that when I open any of my projects, the Toolbox is completely empty. There is not a button, lablel, or checkbox to be had.

As far as I can tell, everything in the Choose Toolbox Items dialog under the System.Windows.Form Namespace is selected, but I still have no tools in the Toolbox. Any idea of what I should do next? (Pulling hair won't help.... it's long gone.) ;)

Thanks in advance for any assistance,

Jonathan
 
OleDbConnection hasn't been in the Toolbox by default since VB.NET 2003, so that wouldn't have been there anyway unless you added it yourself. I would try right-clicking the Toolbox and selecting the Reset option, then customising it to your liking again. If that doesn't work, you might need to re-install VB Express to repair it.
 
Well, I reset the Toolbar (again) and it does the same thing; it says "There are no usable controls in this group. Drag an item into this text to add it to the toolbox." If I right-click on the empty toolbox and toggle "Show All" it shows all the tool, but they are inactive (greyed-out). So, I guess that means that I have to reinstall the VB Express.

Thanks for your reply,

Jonathan
 
Ahh, I went in to uninstall VS 2008 Express, and I saw that I had the option of repairing the program, so I took it. However, it didn't get too far into the operation before it aborted with the message that it (the repair program) couldn't find the "Visual C++ Runtime Prerequisites" - presumably from the online source. Maybe they got moved? I don't guess that there is a way to re-direct the repair program to a new location (even if I knew where that was), so the other option is to delete the program, but that brings up another dilemma. There are about 15-17 programs listed seem to be associated with the VS 2008 Express install. Do I uninstall some or all of them as well? If just some, which ones?

I appreciate the assistance,

Jonathan
 
Never mind....

I took a chance and just downloaded a fresh version of VS 2008 Express installer and installed right over the old version. It brought up the same dialogs as the Uninstall/Repair did, but this time it successfully executed.... and the tools are back!

Sorry for the unnecessary post.

Jonathan
 
Sorry for replying to an old thread here but this same problem happened to me using VB.net 2010 Express - "toolbox is empty." jmcilhinney's response was correct: Right click Toolbox, then Reset. The tools were back, but were "greyed out." I want to point out that this happened when I was on the Code Editor tab: Form1.vb*. When I switched to the Form Design tab: Form1.vb(design), the toolbar items are no longer grayed out. That took me a while to figure out believe it or not!. I started to think I would need to reload VB.net. I thought this might save someone else from panicking like I did and unnecessarily reloading VB.net.
 
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