Add Command prompt in VS 2008 Express Edition manually

Question

Hi all, To add the Command prompt in VS 2008 express edition, i have done the following steps: Tools->ExternalTools->Click on Add-> Then I have entered the following information.

Title: Visual Studio 2008 Command Prompt

Command: cmd.exe

Arguments: %comspec% /k ""C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat"" x86

Initial Directory: $(ProjectDir)

Then OK/Apply:

After this when I went to Tools Menu and click on Visual Studio 2008 Command Prompt, command prompt open but got the following error message: '"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat"' is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.

C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\Common7\IDE>

Please somebody help me to fix this problem.. Or somebody teach me freshly how to add command prompt in Tools Menu manually in VS 2008 Express Edition.

Thanks, Kumar

Answer 1

Why are you specifying the %comspec% environment variable as part of the arguments to cmd.exe? Doesn't %comspec% point to cmd.exe?

I'm also not sure why you added x86 to the end of the arguments, as well.

It seems like it would be enough for the arguments to be /k "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\VC\vcvarsall.bat"

Finally, I'm not at a Windows machine currently, but have you double checked the path to the .bat file? At least for the non-free versions of Visual Studio, I seem to recall the .bat file being something like vsvars.bat or vcvars32.bat. The name could be different for the Express Edition, though.