VS2008 custom clean for C++

Bruce Mahfood 6

Not sure if this is the correct place to ask this, but here goes:

I am currently on a project which was created using VS2008 and is at the moment unable to be moved to a newer version of VS because of dependencies. I have added a build event that creates new files in the solution folder, and those new files are currently not deleted unless associated cpp/h files are updated to a timestamp later than one of the new files. This means that when a clean is done on the solution, the new files remain uncleaned. We want to change it so that when we run clean, these files are deleted (by a command line that specifies them by wildcarded name format).

I have looked for some time now and have come up only with a suggestion to add the following to my vcproj file:

<Target Name="AfterClean">
<Delete Files="$(OutDir)\$(TargetName).exe" ContinueOnError="true" />
</Target>

but from the context of the posts that talk about this, and of the referenced documentation page, and the fact that the poster actually says to add this to the csproj file, it seems this is associated with C#, and it looks like it may also be associated with later versions of VS. I have tried adding this block to my vcproj file, but I get an error reloading the project. The error says that "Target" is not recognized.

My question is whether this is actually something that I could use in VS2008 for adding a custom step to cleaning a C++ project. If it is correct, then where do I place this in the vcproj file such that reloading the project will not give an error. And if it is not correct, is there a syntax that would be able to be used for VS2008 in a C++ project to do such a custom clean step.

If I cannot find such a syntax, the obvious next step is to run a bat file by hand whenever we want to clean these files. If I can avoid that, that would be great. So any help would be appreciated.

Tianyu Sun-MSFT 27,271 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2021-02-10T10:14:15.843+00:00

Hello @Bruce Mahfood , the target codes you mentioned above itself is correct and it will delete the .exe files under $(OutDir)$(TargetName) path. So, did the file that you want to delete is a .exe file? Back to the error message you met, VS2008 is indeed an old version of VS, and actually it is end of support. I can’t reproduce this issue in VS2008 but I tested in VS 2019 and this msbuild target worked. You may need to try other methods.
Bruce Mahfood 6 Reputation points

2021-02-10T22:21:28.46+00:00
Thanks for verifying this should work for C++ in VS2008. I am still confused about where in the vcproj file I would add this. I saw somewhere that indicated the end of the file.

I'm trying to delete with the following line:

<Delete Files="$(SolutionDir)\*_generated.cpp $(SolutionDir)\*_generated.h" />

The end of my vcproj file look like:

</Files> <Globals> </Globals> </VisualStudioProject>

I added the above entry into the Globals element and got the error:

Element 'Target' is unexpected according to content model of parent element 'Globals'.

I don't see where the "Target" element should be added. Could you tell me which element in my vcproj file I should add this new element into?

Also, as you can see above, I assume a space-delimited list of wildcarded patterns in the "Delete Files" argument. If I am incorrect, what is the expected delimiter?

Thanks for the help.
Bruce Mahfood 6 Reputation points

2021-02-10T22:31:17.86+00:00

Sorry about the formatting. Tried changing it but for some reason it wouldn't take. May have been too late to edit.

1 answer

Tianyu Sun-MSFT 27,271 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2021-02-11T08:19:54.513+00:00
Hi @Bruce Mahfood ,

You can try to put the “Target” element inside of <VisualStudioProject> </VisualStudioProject>tag and outside of the <Globals></Globals> tag, for example:

Note that it is not available to use wildcards in the Delete task, if you want to delete multiple files, you can refer to this document: Delete Task and this document: ItemGroup Element and try to use ItemGroup element.(The first document also mentioned this)

Best Regards,
Tianyu

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Bruce Mahfood 6 Reputation points

2021-02-11T13:56:39.43+00:00

I placed it just as you suggested:

<VisualStudioProject>
...
<Globals>
</Globals>
<Target Name="AfterClean">
<Delete Files="$(OutDir)\mytest.txt" ContinueOnError="true" />
</Target>
</VisualStudioProject>

And now I get the error saying Target element not expected in the VisualStudioProject element. I hadn't indicated in my last comment, but I had tried a number of other positions to place it, with no success:

Element 'Target' is unexpected according to content model of parent element 'VisualStudioProject'.

Bruce Mahfood 6 Reputation points

2021-02-11T14:05:33.633+00:00

Also, the Delete Task link you gave shows the Target element being placed inside a Project element, but my vcproj file has a VisualStudioProject element as shown, and as I found, this element does not expect a Target element as child. I continue to be a bit confused as to where this element fits in the vcproj file.

Bruce Mahfood 6 Reputation points

2021-02-16T13:49:02.227+00:00

Anyone able to help me with this? I am very grateful for the confirmation that the Target tag works for a C++ project in VS2008, but I'm still not able to find where to place this. I'm still getting the error shown above ("Target" is unexpected) when I place it where TianyuSun-MSFT suggests. Please let me know what I may still be doing wrong here. Thanks.

Tianyu Sun-MSFT 27,271 Reputation points Microsoft Vendor

2021-02-17T03:09:18.353+00:00

Hi @Bruce Mahfood , sorry for the late reply. I did some research and I noticed that there are something quite different between C++ projects in VS 2008 and C++ projects in VS 2010, VS 2012… As you have seen, the root element, in VS 2008, it is VisualStudioProject and in VS 2010, 2012…, it is Project. Also, since VS 2010, Visual Studio uses vcxproj file instead of using vcproj file. Furthermore, the .vcproj file is not an msbuild script, so the MSBuild command may not work as you(us) expected, please see this answer.

So, we may need to try other solutions. For Build, there are build events and Custom Build Setup to use but for Clean, I’m afraid, it doesn’t seem to have any way to meet your requirement in VS 2008’s C++ project.

Bruce Mahfood 6 Reputation points

2021-02-17T14:45:42.02+00:00

Thanks @Tianyu Sun-MSFT . I was afraid that would be the case. I was wondering from before this about the possibility of using the Custom Build Step, but I haven't seen any way for code in that step to find whether this is a clean or a build. But you seem also to be saying here that the Custom Build Step is only run during a build, and not during a clean, so that makes it not useful in this situation. I guess we're just going to have to create a bat file and run that when we want a deep clean. Thanks again for the help.
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