Error 80040154 (Class Not Registered Exception) When Initializing Vcprojectengineobject (Microsoft.Visualstudio.Vcprojectengine.Dll)

Error 80040154 (Class not registered exception) when initializing VCProjectEngineObject (Microsoft.VisualStudio.VCProjectEngine.dll)

There are not many good reasons this would fail, especially the regsvr32 step. Run dumpbin /exports on that dll. If you don't see DllRegisterServer then you've got a corrupt install. It should have more side-effects, you wouldn't be able to build C/C++ projects anymore.

One standard failure mode is running this on a 64-bit operating system. This is 32-bit unmanaged code, you would indeed get the 'class not registered' exception. Project + Properties, Build tab, change Platform Target to x86.

Class not registered Error

My problem and the solution

1. I have a 32 bit third party dll which I have installed in 2008 R2 machine which is 64 bit.

2. I have a wcf service created in .net 4.5 framework which calls the 32 bit third party dll for process. Now I have build property set to target 'any' cpu and deployed it to the 64 bit machine.

3. When Ii tried to invoke the wcf service got error "80040154 Class not registered (Exception from HRESULT: 0x80040154 (REGDB_E_CLASSNOTREG"

4. Now Ii used ProcMon.exe to trace the com registry issue and identified that the process is looking for the registry entry at HKLM\CLSID and HKCR\CLSID where there is no entry.

5. Came to know that Microsoft will not register the 32 bit com components to the paths HKLM\CLSID, HKCR\CLSID in 64 bit machine rather it places the entry in HKLM\Wow6432Node\CLSID and HKCR\Wow6432Node\CLSID paths.

6. Now the conflict is 64 bit process trying to invoke 32 bit process in 64 bit machine which will look for the registry entry in HKLM\CLSID, HKCR\CLSID. The solution is we have to force the 64 bit process to look at the registry entry at HKLM\Wow6432Node\CLSID and HKCR\Wow6432Node\CLSID.

7. This can be achieved by configuring the wcf service project properties to target to 'X86' machine instead of 'Any'.

8. After deploying the 'X86' version to the 2008 R2 server got the issue "System.BadImageFormatException: Could not load file or assembly"

9. Solution to this badimageformatexception is setting the 'Enable32bitApplications' to 'True' in IIS Apppool properties for the right apppool.

Class not registered error when trying to use COM (even from 32 bit process)

Looks like you might have the wrong GUID. Run regsvr32.exe mydll.dll. As Hans suggests, run process monitor during the registry registration and check to make sure you have the right CLSID

---

Related Topics