Hi.
I am new to this forum and I am a hobbyist experimenter with Arduino and related things as one of the areas in which I dabble. Apologies in advance if I am asking inappropriate questions or questions inappropriately.

Some time back I generated an ESP 32 project
https://github.com/romeo987/TouchDRO_Interface
using an Arduino IDE and Vmicro on VS2019.  At the time I managed and modified it quite happily on my local GitHub clone.
Recently I had occasion to come back to it; I dutifully (foolish, I now realise) updated my VS2019, Vmicro and libraries and then opened my VS solution, only to be hit with red squiggly lines all over. They all SEEM to relate to failure to find the necessary header files way down the chain.
The Arduino IDE seems to put its headers and low level esp32 stuff in a chain that looks like -release_v5.1-bd2b9390ef\esp32\.....
I'm guessing that when I updated the folders recently this path changed and so my local GitHub clone chain failed. By finding the various header files down in the new chain and copying them individually to a directory immediately under my GitHub repo, I seem to be able to eliminate the squiggly lines one by one - a very painful process. I didn't take it through to completion.   
I then copied all my key project files to the Arduino projects directory and opened them from there, expecting the IDE to negotiate the appropriate search path. This was promising, except for one pair of drivers in ESP32_Quad_Encoders.h
#include "driver/gpio.h"
#include "driver/pcnt.h"
which it refuses to find even though I can clearly find them -release_v5.1-bd2b9390ef\esp32\include\driver\pcnt\include\driver\pcnt.h. 
-release_v5.1-bd2b9390ef\esp32\include\driver\gpio\include\driver\gpio.h
 
If I "promote" gpio.h and pcnt.h to a directory just below my Arduino project directory, it finds them OK but
when I look at gpio.h, it has 
#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdbool.h>
#include "sdkconfig.h"
#include "esp_err.h"
#include "esp_intr_alloc.h"
#include "soc/soc_caps.h"
#include "hal/gpio_types.h"
#include "esp_rom_gpio.h"
#include "driver/gpio_etm.h"

and about half of these now it cannot find, even though I can find them somewhere in the tree. If it could find NONE of them, that would be something....
I have spent hours googling about search paths etc, but I am not a software guy, so didn't understand some of the discussions, but the bottom line seems to be "Don't worry, the Arduino IDE will take care of all that". 
And it probably does, and I am  doing something wrong. But I'm at a loss to know what. 
Any suggestions gratefully received.

We tried the project you provided and it only builds with esp32 2.0.0 toolchain. You need to install 2.0.0 using board manager in Visual Micro or the Arduino IDE

Tim,
Then I tried it a second time and got a different error message

Delete this folder C:\Users\roman\AppData\Local\arduino15\packages\esp32

and this folder C:\Users\roman\AppData\Local\arduino15\staging

Then try again.

If that fails delete the folders and see if the arduino ide has same issue.

If that fails let us know what package_index.json you have set.

Ok. 

1) If you need assistance we will need the info requested in yellow near the top of the page. It's always important for us to help.

2) The project is simple but you need to ensure you have not switched off vMicro>Compiler>deep Search. The project references libraries that reference other libraries. They will only be disovered with the default ON deep search setting.

Thanks for the update, can you attach a fresh log after performing the actions below?
1) Run Build > Clean Solution
2) Enable vMicro > Compiler > Verbose
3) Build the project again

To encapsulate the board package and all libraries, the Portable Folder approach would be simplest (and gives a single folder which can be compressed).

So for this you would need to create the "Arduino-Portable" folder next to your SLN file (which I believe is in C:\Users\roman\Documents\git_repos\romeo987\TouchDRO_Interface).

Now when you load your solution, you will need to install the board package again from the Micro Explorer (which will be installed into the Arduino-Portable folder).

If you ensure the sketchbook location is blank on the vMicro > General > IDE Locations screen, it will then use the Arduino-Portable\sketchbook folder.  When you install libraries they will also go beneath the Arduino-Portable\sketchbook\libraries folder.

Does that help?

We will do a video soon covering the different Special Folders' setups, as they are often most useful in certain scenarios.

Apologies, I haven't been clear enough....

The Portable folder is beneath a specific Solution, so only that solution will automatically use the Arduino-Portable folder and sub-folders for board packages and libraries.

Any other solution which is opened (which does not have the folder structure) will continue to use the usual board packages and sketchbook locations as configured before.

How it works

When Visual Micro detects the "solution\Arduino-Portable" the board manager, library manager and the Arduino "sketch book" folder will be assumed to exist below the "Arduino-Portable" folder. Using the Visual Micro board manager, library manager, installing libraries will be installed below the "Arduino-Portable" folder in sub folder "names" specified by the Arduino.cc specifications. Users do not need to do anything other than create the "Arduino-Portable" folder and then use the standard tools, in visual micro, to install boards and libraries.

The result is that when a solution is opened it has an entirely "ring fenced" set of boards and libraries. A solution can contain multiple Arduino projects. Therefore projects that required specific board and library versions can be 1) grouped together 2) pushed into source control with everything that is required to make an identical build at some time in the future.

Optionally, for source control, either add all "Arduino-Portable" files and folders to source control or use shared c++ projects for the core and each library (that is installed below Arduino-Portable). These shared projects should NOT be referenced in the Arduino projects as that will confuse the Arduino compatible build process. The shared projects are simply for code clarity, development assistance and source control.