FIX: D2004 Caused by /Tp or /Tc Option in Visual C++ 4.0

The information in this article applies to:

• The development environment included with: Microsoft Visual C++, 32-bit Edition, version 4.0

SYMPTOMS

If the /Tp or /Tc compiler option is used in a project built within the Developer Studio, one of the following errors occurs:

   Command line error D2004 : '/Tp' requires an argument

   -or-

   Command line error D2004 : '/Tc' requires an argument

RESOLUTION

To work around the problem:

• Build the project from the command line. For example:

  nmake /f <projectname.mak>

  NOTE: You may need to run Vcvars32.bat from the \Msdev\Bin directory to set up the environment variables needed to build from the command line.

  -or-

• Rename the source files to have the needed extension so the /Tp or /Tc option is not needed.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a bug in the Microsoft products listed at the beginning of this article. This bug was corrected in Visual C++ 4.1.

MORE INFORMATION

The /Tc option specifies that the file is a C source file, even if it doesn't have a .c extension. The /Tp option specifies that the file is a C++ source file, even if it doesn't have a .cpp or .cxx extension. These options worked for projects built within the Visual C++ 2.x environment. If you convert a project from version 2.x to 4.0 that has these options, you will get the previously described error.