... or, more appropriately, it's not working at all.

I've been using MSVC++ Express 2005 with no problems lately, but Allegro doesn't seem to want to work with it, or at least the grabber doesn't want to. If I try to run grabber.exe, it tells me that the program "cannot be run because MSVCR80.dll cannot be found." I have no clue why this is happening, or where I might locate this DLL -- reinstalling MSVC didn't do a thing. Any ideas on what I should do here?

EDIT: Upon closer inspection, it seems I do have a file called MSVCR70.dll in C:/windows/system32. Does this mean I need to download the binaries for MSVC 7.0 instead of 8?

DOUBLE EDIT: Damn it, there seems to be only one version of the "tools" download on the files page. Guess that's not what I want.

The thing is, though, I didn't do anything. I just downloaded and installed Allegro yesterday. Nothing has been deleted or edited.

EDIT: Hey, guess what? I DO have that DLL, in the place you mentioned. Apparently Grabber just doesn't want to find it for whatever reason.

I don't know if the .manifest file is embedded or not, but there isn't one in the folder. Could that be the problem?

Also, I just tried running an allegro program that didn't need to use the grabber, and it compiled fine, but got the same missing .dll error. I hope I won't need to find/make .manifest files for all of my projects...

EDIT: Well, I tried throwing that .dll into C:/windows/system32, and I'm not getting the missing .dll error anymore, but now I'm getting a runtime error. Apparently my program "made an attempt to load the C++ runtime library incorrectly," whatever that means. Help!

How would I go about finding this manifest file? Does it come with the binary I downloaded?

Okay, thanks for that. But do I need to rebuild Allegro for the batch file to do anything? Or can I just run it on the pre-built binary that I have?

aadfo, you won't have to worry about that if the batch file works correctly. All a batch (or .bat) file is is a sequence of command-line statements written for you already.

How would I go about rebuilding Allegro then? I don't know anything about this stuff.

... okay, now I'm really angry.

The whole point of rebuilding Allegro like this is to get rid of the missing .dll error I've been getting, right? Well, I did everything msvc.txt told me to do, and then typed in make...

AND I GOT THE MISSING .DLL ERROR.

Now I need some file called mspdb80.dll, or I can't run make.

WHAT THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO DO?

EDIT: To top it all off, I can't find the .dll like I could for the first one. I'm stumped here.

DOUBLE EDIT: Found it. It's in C:\Program Files\MSVS8\Common7\IDE.

TRIPLE EDIT: Whew, I had to change a lot of system variables. Well, I've ALMOST got make working now. For some reason, though, it stops about halfway through, saying it can't find a file called windows.h. Where would I find this file?

Isn't he compiling it for VC? He needs the Platform SDK from Microsoft.

Well, it appears I might be stuck beyond help now:

I ran into that windows.h error, then realized it was in the Microsoft Platform SDK and got it. Then I ran into a missing ddraw.h error, but "ddraw" is blatantly a DirectX header, so I got that too.

But now, it's telling me that I'm missing MSVCR80.dll.

That's right, the very same .dll that made me go and rebuild Allegro in the first place.

Either my computer is seriously messed up, or there's something I'm not thinking of here. Any ideas?

EDIT: Changing the system variable "Path" to include the folder that the .dll is actually in gives me the same error as when I threw the .dll's into C:\windows\system32. Apparently Allegro is unable to load the .dll "correctly." What BS.

VC 8 (also Express) does not use DLL's like that. You cannot just throw them around and assume they will work! With VC8 and XP, Microsoft implemented a complicated system (manifest files, etc) that allows side-by-side system wide installation of multiple versions of the same DLL.

Evert: Yes, it is. Actually, with the binary I have, I can get the following program to run:

#include <allegro.h>

int main(void) 
{
    allegro_init();
    allegro_message("Hello World!");

    return 0;
}
END_OF_MAIN()

So it's not as though MSVC can't find allegro or something. However, if I try to do anything graphics-related, I get the .dll error.

BAF: I already installed that. It came with MSVC.

EDIT: Is it possible for someone to just send me these manifest files? I really need to get this working as soon as possible.

DOUBLE EDIT: I think I may have found the problem. I found the .manifest file for one of my Allegro projects, and opened it up. The manifest file seems to be pointing to the right folder, but the "version number" specified in it is lower than the actual .dll's. How do I tell MSVC that there are newer .dlls out?