Unresolved external "int __cdecl invoke_main(void)" after VS2017 15.6.1 update

Question

I hope someone can help/guide me here. I had a working application, but today I keep getting the following error:

LNK2019 unresolved external symbol main referenced in function "int __cdecl invoke_main(void)" (?invoke_main@@YAHXZ)

The only thing that changed was that I updated VS2017 15.5.4 to VS2017 15.6.1 (latest). I been reading here and there, and I believe somewhere some setting may have changed and now the program is failing to "see" the main function. For the record, I did try this code in my laptop which still has VS2017 15.5.4 and ran without any issues. Any idea what it may be?

Is the issue happening regardless of the selected configuration (Debug/Release) and architecture (x86/x64)? — Kirill Shlenskiy, Mar 12 '18 at 23:54
I am using several other libraries, and I have not setup Release versions nor Debug x86 architecture. I only have Debug x64. — Velchivz, Mar 13 '18 at 00:07
What's the file name including your main function? Is it added in your vsproject? — ravin.wang, Mar 13 '18 at 00:40
It is added. I tried excluding and include again. Issue is still there. — Velchivz, Mar 13 '18 at 00:54

score 8 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 13 '18 at 00:28

8

Check your project config.

Right-click the project -> Properties -> Linker -> System -> SubSystem.

You probably want that to be set to Windows (/SUBSYSTEM:WINDOWS)

answered Mar 13 '18 at 00:28

Kirill Shlenskiy

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Tried this, issue still remains. – Velchivz Mar 13 '18 at 00:38
This did the trick. It must be because I chose an empty project. It was set to console application by default. – annoying_squid Dec 03 '18 at 16:55

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 20 '18 at 20:45

3

I couldn't find a fix to it. I had to make a new project and move everything there.

answered Mar 20 '18 at 20:45

Velchivz

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score 3 · Answer 3 · answered Dec 21 '21 at 19:08

I got exactly this error when I was linking against the SDL2 libraries, but only included SDL2.lib and forgot SDL2main.lib. The error appeared as soon as I included sdl.h in my source code, without directly calling any SDL functions in the code. I was confused because of the reference to invoke_main(void) and thus didn't suspect that any external libraries were missing when linking.

score 0 · Answer 4 · answered Mar 13 '18 at 00:44

0

Check these points:

Is the .c/.cpp file including main function added into your vsproject file?
Make sure "Configuration -> C/C++ -> Advance -> Calling Conversion -> __cdelc(/Gd)" to be selected

answered Mar 13 '18 at 00:44

ravin.wang

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1) The file with main function is added to vsproject file (this code works on older version of VS2017, I also tried to exclude then include). 2) It is selected to that option. Issue still remain. – Velchivz Mar 13 '18 at 00:53

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered May 04 '21 at 12:27

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This worked for me:

In the solution explorer, Right click the file containing main() function and exclude it from project.
Right click project and select add existing item and add the excluded file back to project.
Clean the project and build.

answered May 04 '21 at 12:27

Sumant

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score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Dec 04 '21 at 11:50

0

If you are using CMake project - most likely you have CMakeLists.txt somewhere in your project that calls add_executable(MY_TARGET my_source.cpp) and this target's source file's name is different.

That is why this error occurred in my case.

answered Dec 04 '21 at 11:50

vocasle

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score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Jan 16 '23 at 15:08

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Try including tchar.h header file, along with windows.h:

#include <windows.h>
#include <tchar.h>

Also, the linker subsystem property should be Windows (/SUBSYSTEM:WINDOWS)

answered Jan 16 '23 at 15:08

Shivam Mishra

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How is `#include ` helping to find `main()`? – Christian Severin Jan 17 '23 at 13:52

Unresolved external "int __cdecl invoke_main(void)" after VS2017 15.6.1 update

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