Hello,

I've been playing with my Arduino for the last 3 weeks.  And I've just been using the standard IDE that comes with it.

I'm now writing more sophisticated programs and I'm finding it very difficult to debug my code and see what's not working correctly.  I've been sending output to the Serial Monitor but I need more than that now.

I was delighted when I saw your add-on to Visual Studio.  I've installed it but I am getting an error when I try to build or run my project.

I've downloaded the latest Arduino IDE which is 1.6.6. And I'm using Video Studio Community Version 2013.

In Visual Micro I have set the Ide as 16.6.  The board is Arduino /Genuino Uno. 

I would appreciate any help that you can provide.  I'm new to Visual Studio so I can't work out how to fix this error.

The error I am getting when I try to build or start debugging is below:

Build Core Paths: C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\cores\arduino
"{runtime.tools.avr-gcc.path}/bin/avr-gcc" -c -g -x assembler-with-cpp -mmcu=atmega328p -DF_CPU=16000000L -DARDUINO=10606 -DARDUINO_AVR_UNO -DARDUINO_ARCH_AVR -I"C:\Users\Tony\Documents\Arduino\Seven_Segment_LED\3MyCountdownClock" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\cores\arduino" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\variants\standard" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\Common7\IDE\Extensions\zpbj2eh0.ijo\Micro Platforms\default\debuggers\VM_DBG" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\libraries" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\libraries" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\Common7\IDE\Extensions\zpbj2eh0.ijo\Micro Platforms\default\debuggers" -I"C:\Users\Tony\Documents\Arduino\libraries" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\cores\arduino\wiring_pulse.S" -o _pulse.S.o"   -DVM_DEBUG -DVM_DEBUG_ENABLE=1 -DVM_DEBUG_BANDWIDTH_THROTTLE_MS=50 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_HARDWARESERIAL=0 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_SOFTWARESERIAL=1 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_FASTSERIAL=2 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_USB=3 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_TEENSY=4 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_UART=5 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_USART=6 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_USBSERIAL=7 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_TTYUART=8 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_NET_CONSOLE=9 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_Uart=10 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_COSA=11 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE=VM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_HARDWARESERIAL
The system cannot find the file specified
     Process: "{runtime.tools.avr-gcc.path}\bin\avr-gcc" -c -g -x assembler-with-cpp -mmcu=atmega328p -DF_CPU=16000000L -DARDUINO=10606 -DARDUINO_AVR_UNO -DARDUINO_ARCH_AVR -I"C:\Users\Tony\Documents\Arduino\Seven_Segment_LED\3MyCountdownClock" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\cores\arduino" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\variants\standard" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\Common7\IDE\Extensions\zpbj2eh0.ijo\Micro Platforms\default\debuggers\VM_DBG" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\libraries" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\libraries" -I"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\Common7\IDE\Extensions\zpbj2eh0.ijo\Micro Platforms\default\debuggers" -I"C:\Users\Tony\Documents\Arduino\libraries" "C:\Program Files (x86)\Arduino\hardware\arduino\avr\cores\arduino\wiring_pulse.S" -o _pulse.S.o"   -DVM_DEBUG -DVM_DEBUG_ENABLE=1 -DVM_DEBUG_BANDWIDTH_THROTTLE_MS=50 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_HARDWARESERIAL=0 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_SOFTWARESERIAL=1 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_FASTSERIAL=2 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_USB=3 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_TEENSY=4 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_UART=5 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_USART=6 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_USBSERIAL=7 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_TTYUART=8 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_NET_CONSOLE=9 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_Uart=10 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_COSA=11 -DVM_DEBUGGER_TYPE=VM_DEBUGGER_TYPE_HARDWARESERIAL
Error compiling core

Not a silly question at all.  I think the answer is No.  I have since tried looking for answers and I heard at least one person state that you need to run the Arduino IDE after install of Visual Micro as the Arduino iDE ms supposed to do some updates.  Is that true?

Thank you.  I've actually taken this opportunity to install Visual Studio Community 2015.  Once I've done that.  I'll install Visual Micro over the top.  Then according to your instructions, I'll run the Arduino IDE.  Then go into Visual Stdio and it should be able to find the missing directories.  Is my understanding correct?  And thank you for the explanation and responding as quickly as you have.

Thank you. I did as you suggested and the problem has been resolved.

I now need to read the Visual Micro documentation as, for some reason, it is flying past the breakpoints I have set up instead of stopping and allowing me to either step into, step over or view variable values.  I do know that with breakpoints with Visual Micro that the breakpoint occurs after the command on the breakpoint line has been completed as opposed to before as it customary for other languages.  However, as I said, it is flying past it and I'm sure this is a result of user error so I'll read the doco to understand how this all works.

Thanks again.