.arx cannot find a dll or other file that it needs.

[ShricharanaB]

Hi,

The .arx file I created is loading in my workstation but fails to load in other workstations. 

I'm getting the following error:

"ExamplePath\ExName.arx cannot find a dll or other file that it needs.
AcRxDynamicLinker failed to load 'ExamplePath\ExName.arx'
ExamplePath\ExName.arx Unable to load ExName.arx file."

I'm unable to figure out the reason for this. 

I'm using AutoCAD 2020.

For development I'm using

Visual studio 2022 

Windows SDK: 10.0.22621.0 

Platform toolset: Visual Studio 2017 (v141)

Can anybody please help?

Thanks in advance.

[ShricharanaB]

Can any one help in this? Any suggestions? 

[daniel_cadext]

Use a dependency checker.  I like to use this.

https://github.com/lucasg/Dependencies

Most likely it’s a path issue

[ShricharanaB]

Hi,

Thank you for the reply.

I used the dependency checker you suggested and got the following missing.

Even with these showing missing it loads fine in my workstation.

I checked the support file search paths in one of the user workstation and they seem to be the same as in my workstation. Namely Trusted locations, working support file search path, support file search path, is there any other location I should be checking?

[daniel_cadext]

The AutoCAD .DLLS are loaded at runtime. You might put your ARX file(s) inside the AutoCAD install folder on one of the offending workstations, then run the  dependency checker on that.

[ShricharanaB]

Thank you so much! I think I'm getting somewhere now.

I don't have write access to the installation folder . But I copied the three missing dlls from AutoCAD installation folder to the folder my dll is in and checked for dependencies in both my workstation and one of the other users work station. 

In my workstation there was no missing dlls shown in the dependency checker. 

But, in the other workstation, i'm getting these following dlls as missing.

It seems these dlls are part of  Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable. 

I'll have to try installing it and loading the dll to see if this will work. 

But, why the requirement now (updated using visual studio 2022, platform toolset 2017 v141), for these dlls, where as the previous version (created with visual studio 2017, platform toolset 2017 v141)  did not need these and used to successfully load in all systems. 

Is there a way I can remove the requirement for these dlls or are they essential?

 

[m_latz · Accepted solution]

Looks like you build your project with the "Debug" configuration. This works only on pc's, with debug environment (i.e. on pc with installed Visual Studio or debug env).

You have to build your project as "Release", then it works as expected.

regards

Markus

[ShricharanaB]

Thank you!

That solved the issue.

Unbelievably silly mistake!😅

[autodaug]

It would be nice if Windows reported the missing file name(s) somewhere in an event log or made it available somewhere for AutoCAD to display.  But, afaik, there's no way for us to get at this information, unfortunately.