Could not load file or assembly 'Microsoft.VisualStudio.Enterprise.ASPNetHelper

Question

I was using the Visual Studio Profiler on my web application when at some point while it was running Visual Studio crashed. Now everytime I try to run my web application I get this exception in the web browser:

Could not load file or assembly 'Microsoft.VisualStudio.Enterprise.ASPNetHelper

Here is what I have tried so far, but did not correct the error:

• restored the original web.config (removing all the profiler additions that were automatically added)
• deleted all binaries and source, pulled all code fresh, and rebuilt the entire web application
• deleted the web application entry in iis
• deleted all files in \WINDOWS\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v2.0.50727\Temporary ASP.NET Files

I must be missing something small somewhere. It is as if there is still a binary that is still instrumented somewhere or something and is referencing ASPNetHelper. I don't know.

I'm using: Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Version 9.0.30729.1 SP

Any thoughts on what else I could try? Thanks!

Answer 1

Found it! There was a reference to Microsoft.VisualStudio.Enterprise.ASPNetHelper in C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\web.config. As soon as I removed that, it worked! Since I never work out of that folder, I never thought to look there.

Answer 2

To expand upon Jon's answer:

The 'Microsoft.VisualStudio.Enterprise.ASPNetHelper' library is used with Visual Studio Profiling: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd255412.aspx .

If you are no longer using profiling or do not have a version of Visual Studio that is using the Visual Studio Profiling tool this may be why it throws an error. In my case, I had a different version of Visual Studio than my co-worker.

Re-moving reference in the web.config resolved the issue.