Visual Studio 2012 missing frameworks

Question

I have installed Visual Studio 2012 today, and i was excited, because i wanted to experiment with the latest framework version (.net 4.5). But it seems like Visual Studio 2012 doesnt show .net 4.0 and 4.5 in the New Projects dialog. I have had a simlar problem with Visual Studio 2010, but the lower framework versions (3.0, 2.0) didnt show up there. Does anyone know how to get them to show up? Thanks :)

Answer 1

You probably do not have the Windows 8.1 SDK installed. Visual Studio 2012, nor its updates, link the .NET Framwork 4.5 libraries for development.

• Windows 8.1 SDK

You don't have to install the full SDK if you are just looking for the option to build web apps, just the .NET Framework 4.5.1 option in the installer. The full install is about 1.1GB, but just the .NET installer is only 72MB.

For those reading this that have not updated their copy of Visual Studio 2012, make sure you also have these installed:

• Visual Studio 2012 Update 4
• ASP.NET and Web Tools 2013.1 for Visual Studio 2012

Hope this helps!

Answer 2

It is most likely the case that your VS 2012 install is corrupted. Uninstalling and reinstalling it should fix this issue.

Others have documented this issue (with both VS 2012 RP and RTM):

VS2012 RTM missing .net 4.5 and mvc project templates

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vssetup/thread/17ff0bb3-e37e-4978-a5a1-c30a8cef1dfe

Answer 3

I had this issue with VS2012 and fixed it by using a working install on another PC.

Copy the C:\Program Files (x86)\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework folder from the good install into the folder on the failed install.

Target frameworks showed back up when I started VS2012, haven't run into any issues since.