MSBuild failing in Cpp.Targets searching for 'True.dpr', with a new XE4 project

Question

I am encountering some odd msbuild errors with a project in RAD Studio XE4, and am seeking help to diagnose what's going on. I've been encountering this for a couple of weeks now but have not succeeded in solving it myself - time to ask more widely. Symptoms are:

• With a project that has been built and run from within the IDE, msbuild Project.cbproj appears to work
• Running msbuild Project.cbproj /t:Clean works, and deletes intermediate files fine. A visual scan of the output doesn't show any unusual files being deleted - just .obj files, linker state files, the final EXE, etc.
• But running msbuild Project.cbproj /t:Build or just plain msbuild Project.cbproj after either cleaning or on a clean checkout fails with the following error message:

Microsoft (R) Build Engine Version 3.5.30729.5420 [Microsoft .NET Framework, Version 2.0.50727.5472] Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation 2007. All rights reserved.

Build started 12/09/2013 10:35:03. Project "C:\projects\Project.cbproj" on node 0 (default targets).

_PasDepCheck: Modified: Source\Common\resample.pas _PasCoreCompile: Embarcadero Delphi for Win32 compiler version 25.0 Copyright (c) 1983,2013 Embarcadero Technologies, Inc. C:\Program Files (x86)\Embarcadero\RAD Studio\11.0\Bin\CodeGear.Cpp.Targets(191 1,5): error F1026: File not found: 'True.dpr' Done Building Project "C:\projects\Project.cbproj" (default targets) -- FAILED.

Build FAILED.

"C:\projects\Project.cbproj" (default target) (1) -> (_PasCoreCompile target) -> C:\Program Files (x86)\Embarcadero\RAD Studio\11.0\Bin\CodeGear.Cpp.Targets(1 911,5): error F1026: File not found: 'True.dpr'

0 Warning(s)
1 Error(s)

Some things strike me about this:

• It lists two versions of .Net at the top, an older one in square brackets. Could it be loading or using parts of two frameworks?
• True.dpr does not exist, nor can I find an entry manually searching the .cbproj file for a True.dpr, or for a True entry that looks (to me) like it could be misinterpreted as a project name. (If you are not familiar with Delphi, a .dpr file is an old-fashioned project file - it contains the entry point. Building one may imply msbuild is finding a source or project entry somewhere. 'True' seems to me like the .cbproj file is being misinterpreted or is corrupted - but it's brand new, so shouldn't be, and it works from within the IDE.)

Other information about the system and projects:

• The project is being upgraded from RAD Studio 2010. However, the project file was created in XE4 from scratch, ie it's brand new, by creating a new project in the IDE and adding the existing units (Delphi and C++ files.)
• The project is a C++ project with one or two Delphi units. You can see it is falling over when compiling a Delphi unit at the start of the compilation. For those not familiar with mixing C++ and Delphi, typically in mixed-source projects the IDE or msbuild would compile the Delphi units first (doing so can create / update C++ headers to interface with the Delphi code.)
• The project is one of a group, but should compile stand-alone.
• I have RAD Studio XE4 installed with Update 1.
• msbuild is being launched from the RAD Studio XE4 command line, ie one which uses the rsvars.bat file to set up the paths etc.
• In the above output, I have changed our real project name to Project because I don't want to identify it. However, the rest of the output is exact.

Any ideas? I've been trying to solve it for ages, and am stumped.

Answer 1

I just had this same error in Delphi XE5. Running MSBUILD with /v:diag outputs the complete commandline for DCC32, which had a rogue true amongst the parameters.

The following page pointed to the solution: http://wiert.me/2013/11/20/when-the-delphi-xe5-commandline-compiler-fails-with/

In this case I was passing the parameter /p:DCC_DebugInformation=true, but this could also be in the .dproj file. Changing true to 2 fixed the problem - i.e.

MSBBUILD /p:DCC_DebugInformation=2 project.dproj