Here we go again, the HL7 accelerator. I never get how this can happen, now I am missing my project templates (and wizard) for HL7 projects in Visual Studio 2012 in combination with BizTalk 2013 and SQL Server 2008 R2.

After some research around the web I encountered a few posts, this one being most helpful:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/biztalknotes/archive/2013/10/02/biztalk-2013-hl7-installation-error.aspx

Bottomline: you have to have SQL Server 2012 Data Tools & SDK installed

So a SQL Server 2008 R2 installation won’t work, nor having SQL Server 2012 installed on a different machine. Quite frustrating. Here’s a quick walkthrough on how to solve this issue.

First off choose for a custom installation and look if the Starter Project option is available. If it’s not, you are probably missing the following directory and its DLLs:

 C:/Program Files (x86)/Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0/VC#/VCSPackages/csproj.dll
(sorry but backslashes screw up the post)

Starter Project is not listed

Starter Project is listed

You have to install some SQL Server 2012 components to get this directory – mind you SQL Server 2012 Express works as well! So start the SQL Server 2012 installation and find the following features:

• SQL Server Data Tools
• Client Tools SDK

 After you finish the installation you can check whether the directory (and library) exist now ( C:/Program Files (x86)/Microsoft Visual Studio 10.0/VC#/VCSPackages/csproj.dll). Go ahead with the HL7 accelerator installation and the Starter Project should be listed now, as should you project templates in Visual Studio after installation.

Good luck!