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A new Visual Studio (version 2017) issue started recently that prevents me from opening ANY files using the File -> Open -> File menu item (or its shortcut Ctrl + O).

Error message from Visual Studio:

Error message from Visual Studio

There are plenty of posts on various web sites including Stack Overflow that deal with not being able to open file related to a solution, like deleting the .sou files. The discussion forums at Microsoft are basically useless with answers stating that they cannot reproduce the error, so it's not a bug. None of the help pages that I have read online has helped at all. This is not a problem with any particular VS solution or project. I cannot open any file even when there are no projects open.

karel
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BlueMax
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    Are you loading VS in Administrator mode? Have you upgraded your .Net Framework/.Net Core version? Any yellow flags top-right corner of the VS window? Have you tried signing out and back in again? – spikey_richie Sep 23 '19 at 15:06
  • Not running in Admin Mode (never had to in the past), Have not updated .NET. There is a yellow flag in the corner indicating that VS2017 update version 15.9.16 is available, but I am trying to find out why this odd behavior just started. Have not tried signing out and in, but will give it a try. [ Update] Running as Admin or signing out and in does not solve the problem. – BlueMax Sep 23 '19 at 15:31
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    While this does not get to the root of the problem, updating VS2017 to version 15.9.16 seems to clear up this issue. I suspect some configuration file or other was restored. – BlueMax Sep 24 '19 at 12:51
  • @BlueMax You should post your comment that the upgrade fixed the issue as an answer to your own question. You can then accept your answer – Dave M Sep 30 '19 at 11:10

1 Answers1

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Updating Visual Studio 2017 to version 15.9.16 seems to clear up this issue.

karel
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  • This was a problem that just started happening after many months of working fine. While doing the upgrade did make the VS work as intended, it did not actually answer the question of why it had that problem in the first place, and what did updating the application do that fixed it. – BlueMax Sep 30 '19 at 17:31
  • What you reported in your question does not exclude the possibility of an unreported bug that was fixed by an update before the bug was reported publicly. – karel Sep 30 '19 at 23:31