Is it possible to write code for Windows without using Visual Studio?

Question

1.00/5 (5 votes)

See more:

Hi,
I want to know that can you write production worthy code for Windows without using stupid Visual Studio? I had been using visual studio professional(for which I paid almost INR 65000 which is USD 993). When I tried to upgrade to Visual Studio 2015 Professional, all I got was a corrupted windows registry. You cannot possibly uninstall visual studio without destroying your windows installation (Evidence). Now can you develop code for windows without using visual studio?

Posted 17-Aug-15 6:57am

0xF4

Add a Solution

Comments

Richard MacCutchan 17-Aug-15 15:20pm

You really should be talking to Microsoft about this. How are they going to fix it if you don't tell them what is going wrong?

0xF4 17-Aug-15 21:43pm

I have pasted a link in the question titled 'Evidence', please have a look at it.

Richard MacCutchan 18-Aug-15 2:58am

Like I said, you should be talking to Microsoft about this. There is nothing anyone here can do to fix Microsoft bugs.

Philippe Mori 17-Aug-15 21:17pm

With large hard drives, the safest approach is to never uninstall old versions and only install version in increasing order. If you have to reinstall the system, then install only the versions you still need.

3 solutions

Solution 1

Developing for Windows is really best with Visual Studio.

If you really desire something else I would recommand to take a look at Xamarin. It has the big advantage that is for multi-platform.

Other possibilities are Eclipse or GCC or Qt Trolltech.

You must have done something wrong. Maybe you mismatched the languages or installed on different accounts. I would try to make a clean install of Windows, install all service updates and than make a full backup and give it another try. It takes some hours, so you bet get some coffee and a surfing machine. Good luck ;-)

Posted 17-Aug-15 7:27am

KarstenK

Comments

0xF4 17-Aug-15 13:59pm

Hi Karsten, the problem I had was that when I used the Programs And Features thingy to uninstall, it did something which locked the administrator account out of virtually every folder. I finally had to make a clean install of windows. I don't think that I did anything wrong. This actually happened twice, the first time on windows 7 and the second time on windows 8.1. The second time I was able to get rid of it without destroying windows but it took almost 48 hours. Anyway I just bought a new notebook and I am not going to take that risk on it. As for Xamarin, I generally code in Java, C and C++, Occasionally in PHP, Python, Objective C. Java is no problem, I use netbeans for that, but netbeans does not have very good C and C++ compiler integration, but I can live with that. The problem is, that GCC doesn't support the Win32 API fully. A complex problem....

Dave Kreskowiak 17-Aug-15 14:21pm

Well, that's not because of the uninstall of Visual Studio. That's something else entirely. I KNOW you're going to say "it only happened because of the uninstall of Visual Studio!". The problem with that statement is the Visual Studio installer doesn't do anything at all with accounts and permissions on any folders other than its own folders under Program Files and the Visual Studio folder under My Documents.

There is something else seriously wrong with your Windows install that's causing this.

I've installed and uninstalled Visual Studio countless times without having any problems like you're describing.

0xF4 17-Aug-15 14:30pm

Hi Dave, I provided a link in my question which shows how many people are having this problem. I know that visual studio doesn't do anything to accounts and folder permissions, but in order to provide a highly integrated experience, it create many new and edits a lot of the existing registry keys. Now during uninstall, it somehow goof's up when removing those keys and restoring the registry. That is how the problem arises.

Add a Solution

Add your solution here

Treat my content as plain text, not as HTML

Preview 0

…

Existing Members

Sign in to your account

...or Join us

Download, Vote, Comment, Publish.

Your Email
Password
Forgot your password?

Your Email
This email is in use. Do you need your password?
Optional Password

I have read and agree to the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy
Please subscribe me to the CodeProject newsletters

When answering a question please:

Read the question carefully.
Understand that English isn't everyone's first language so be lenient of bad spelling and grammar.
If a question is poorly phrased then either ask for clarification, ignore it, or edit the question and fix the problem. Insults are not welcome.
Don't tell someone to read the manual. Chances are they have and don't get it. Provide an answer or move on to the next question.

Let's work to help developers, not make them feel stupid.

This content, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-17T10:40:00

Yes, I faced such problems, but not with Windows 2015. In the past, I faced some problems only with uninstallation of some Community Technology Preview followed by the installation of officially released version. The problem led to corruption of the installation database, so "Uninstall or change a program" applet could not be loaded. The problem was fixed by a using 3rd-party registry cleaner which also included better uninstallation facility. I don't think you need further detail, because you are struggling with different version.

So, I just want to give you an idea. It's pretty usual that you have some installer which does not uninstall correctly. It leads to contamination of system registry. In such cases, some manual step usually help. Basically, you need to learn the footprint of the installation and remove manually just all related files. After this step, you have inconsistent registry, because some registry entries may still point to non-existing files. Then you can use some 3rd-party registry cleaner until it reports no problem. This is not an absolutely reliable approach, but it does help.

—SA

CPallini · Accepted Answer · 2015-08-17T09:59:00

Solution 2

Of course you can, and depending on the kind of application you intend to develop, there are many alternatives.
It is worth noting, however that Visual Studio is simply the best IDE for Windows.

Posted 17-Aug-15 9:59am

CPallini

v3

Comments

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 17-Aug-15 16:28pm

5ed (but I would never dub anything "best", because you never know what's emerging when you are writing your line).
—SA

CPallini 17-Aug-15 16:34pm

Indeed, but the debugger alone is great.
By the way, thank you.

Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov 17-Aug-15 16:41pm

Sure, but I used many different IDE and found many good features; nevertheless, I personally prefer VS.
Your answer did not address the inquirer's troubles with uninstallation, so please see my advice in Solution 3.
—SA

enhzflep 19-Aug-15 0:10am

Indeed. Best debugger I've ever used and, the only reason I'd ever touch VS when not at work.