System.Web.Mvc.HtmlHelper<object> does not contain a definition for ActionLink

 

I spent some time playing with ASP.NET MVC 2 RC . Everything was smooth and nice until I tried to upload my simple app on a “production” server.

The app its self was a basic test app without any valuable functionality , but I wanted to test the deployment process of such an app.

So I copied the  files on the machine and made some configuration changes on the web server. I opened my web browser, hit the app and KA-BOOOOM …… I got the yellow screen of pain:

 

NOTES: my server has .NET 3.5 SP1 installed and System.Web.MVC.dll 2.0 registered in GAC.

All my trials to find a solution from someone else failed. I’ve checked if  I have all the needed namespaces in the <pages>/<namespaces> tag. I’ve checked if my app is configured to work

I’ve checked if I have the right assemblies deployed on the machine. Still no success!

 

Fortunately, I had a luck and found the problem my self by exploring the Web.config file. I found that I had by mistake replaced a symbol in the CompilerVersion string

 

So I replaced the “?” symbol with “p” and the yellow screen disappeared.