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"Children could not be evaluated" tooltip when debugging objects exported from a DLL.

In my solution, I have an unmanaged C++ DLL (I have the source code available to me), and a managed/unmanaged Visual C++ executable that uses the DLL in it. When I'm debugging the executable and come across an object that was exported from the DLL, and I hover the mouse over it, it shows only "Children could not be evaluated", instead of showing all the member variables of the object.

I checked my output window and it shows that it loads the DLL with symbols, but other than that, I really don't know what else to look for.

Edit: On further inspection, I can view all member variables after I step into code that is part of the DLL itself, but from my executable's code, I can't view them- As I can't just step into the DLL's code arbitrarily, this is a problematic- is there some way I can change this?

Nyxojaele Saturday, October 10, 2009 2:35 AM

Sorry but the only way to evaluate the children is to have the current stack frame use the expression evaluator for your DLL. Since your dll is native, it needs to use the native expression evaluator.

Not sure if that made sense.

Essentially the solution you describe is the only way to evalute the children. The current frame (where the yellow ip glyph is) has to be a native frame.

Marked As Answer byrchiodo - MSFTModeratorTuesday, October 13, 2009 4:37 PM

rchiodo - MSFT Tuesday, October 13, 2009 4:37 PM

Marked As Answer byrchiodo - MSFTModeratorTuesday, October 13, 2009 4:37 PM

rchiodo - MSFT Tuesday, October 13, 2009 4:37 PM

I see. Well thank you for the answer- at least I understand what's going on now. I don't suppose there's a way to force a different expression evaluator at all, is there?

Nyxojaele Tuesday, October 13, 2009 10:02 PM

You can use google to search for other answers

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