title: How to use the Visual Studio 2012 command line tool from system()
body: <p>I am attempting to compile and run one visual C++ program (project1) from another visual C++ program (project2) using msbuild and other commands available in the Visual studio command line tool but not in the windows command line tool. Everything works fine if I run it in the visual studio command line tool. For example I can build using msbuild and it works just as I want it to. When I try to run the same command in my C++ program using system(), the system call appears to use the Windows command line and therefore cannot find any of the commands (msbuild in this example).  I am new to working with system() on windows (although I have extensive experience with it using Linux).  Is there some way to make my C++ program use the Visual Studio command line environment when I call system (rather than Windows command line environment)? 
  Using the command window manually is not an option.  I need to compile and test a series of 200-300 different versions of the program in the project1.  This is why I am writing program2</p>