VisualStudio 2012 crash on start - Driver Common Package error

[DaveWilson (Austin)]

Visual Studio 2012 has myseriously stopped working for me since yesterday afternoon. Whenever I try to start it, I now see a message box stating:

"Driver Common Package

Error loading the driver common package:
No exports were found that match the constraint:
ContractName
Microsoft.VisualStudio.Utilities.IContentTypeRegistryService
RequiredTypeIdentity
Microsoft.VisualStudio.Utilities.IContentTypeRegistryService"

Some hints as to what a user should actually do as a result of this problem would be greatly appreciated given that the error is, at least to me, 100% opaque and equally as unhelpful.

Starting the IDE again with the -log option, I see the following errors in ActivityLog.xml:

217 ERROR Type provided must be an Enum. Parameter name: enumType
C:\Users\a0190789\AppData\Local\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\ComponentModelCache\Microsoft.VisualStudio.Default.cache Microsoft.VisualStudio.CommonIDE.ExtensibilityHosting.VsShellComponentModelHost 2013/08/02 00:25:44.463
218 ERROR An error occured while loading assembly cache from the cache file:
C:\Users\a0190789\AppData\Local\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\ComponentModelCache\Microsoft.VisualStudio.Default.cache Microsoft.VisualStudio.CommonIDE.ExtensibilityHosting.VsShellComponentModelHost 2013/08/02 00:25:44.464
219 ERROR Type provided must be an Enum. Parameter name: enumType
C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\MICROSOFT VISUAL STUDIO 11.0\COMMON7\IDE\COMMONEXTENSIONS\MICROSOFT\EDITOR\Microsoft.VisualStudio.Platform.VSEditor.dll Microsoft.VisualStudio.CommonIDE.ExtensibilityHosting.VsShellComponentModelHost 2013/08/02 00:25:44.464
220 Warning Temporary turn off caching for this assembly for the current session of the application
C:\PROGRAM FILES (X86)\MICROSOFT VISUAL STUDIO 11.0\COMMON7\IDE\COMMONEXTENSIONS\MICROSOFT\EDITOR\Microsoft.VisualStudio.Platform.VSEditor.dll Microsoft.VisualStudio.CommonIDE.ExtensibilityHosting.VsShellComponentModelHost 2013/08/02 00:25:44.464


This sounds like some kind of corruption to me and in other circumstances I would likely just reinstall the tool and try again. Unfortunately, I'm traveling this week and have no access to an installation disk. Can anyone offer any suggestions to get me back up and running in the meantime without the need for a DVD or a fat internet pipe? In case it may be relevant, I installed WDK 8.0 yesterday afternoon. Visual Studio worked fine after this as far as I can remember but it hasn't worked since the first reboot after the WDK installation.

Thanks in advance!

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