The wizard analyzes the
Net Express project file, its configuration settings and the dependencies set, and creates one or more Visual Studio native
projects based on this information, imports the existing source code into them, and sets the requisite project and file properties from the original
Net Express project. It can optionally produce and display a detailed conversion report.
The wizard takes the following information from the
Net Express project:
- file dependencies and all output file types produced by the project
- the type of application that is being built, such as a console application or a library
- the build configurations such as Generic Debug Build and Generic Release Build
- the paths for copybooks that aren't in known locations such as the solution folder tree, links from the solution, and the
cpylib folder in the installation
- the Compiler directives and build settings
- how the application starts, such as any command line arguments
Note: If you have any questions or comments about the
Net Express Project Import Wizard or upgrading to
Studio Enterprise Edition in general, please use the Micro Focus Community pages (
http://community.microfocus.com/Home) to get in touch with us and other
Studio Enterprise Edition users.
The structure of a
Net Express project is similar to that of a Visual Studio solution, where the solution represents a whole application. A solution can contain multiple projects, each one producing a single or multiple output files. The final application then can contain a mixture of .exe or .dll files files.
- Visual Studio projects and project types
- Depending on the output files they produced in the available configurations (for example, Generic Debug Build or Generic Release Build),
Net Express projects convert to different Visual Studio project types as shown below:
| Files created by the
Net Express project
|
Visual Studio project type after the conversion
|
| A single output file
|
A single Visual Studio project
|
| A mixture of executable files - .exe and .dll files
|
Multiple Visual Studio projects in the same solution, each of which produces single or multiple executables - .exe or .dll files.
|
| .int or .gnt files only
|
The import wizard prompts you to specify the type of Visual Studio project to create (INT/GNT being the default one, Console, Link Library, or Windows Forms) and the files it will include.
|
| .lbr files only
|
For each .lbr in the
Net Express project, the wizard creates a corresponding INT/GNT project that compiles to a single .lbr file.
Note: The .lbr files produced by
Studio Enterprise Edition can only contain COBOL source files and cannot include data files.
You can copy any data files that are part of the project to the output folder but they will exist as separate files and will not be packaged in the .lbr. To configure this, set
Copy To Output Directory in the properties of the data file.
|
| A combination of different output file types (.int, .gnt, .lbr, .exe or .dll)
|
One project for each .lbr, .exe or .dll file, and the wizard prompts you to specify a project type for the .int and .gnt files as detailed above.
|
- Copybook paths
- Copybook paths are determined by how the Visual Studio project is structured and by what dependency each file has. If a file depends on another file in a different folder, that folder is added to the copybook paths.
- Directives
- The directives set on project or file level are taken from the
Net Express project.
For more on upgrading
Net Express applications to
Studio Enterprise Edition, see
Upgrading to
Studio Enterprise Edition.
