It seems that the color coding of my Visual Studio 2019 suddenly changed. When I check the settings in Tools -> Options -> Environment -> Font and Colors and then for example User Members - Methods, I see that it no longer has a foreground color. My colleague with the same VS has this set to Olive.
I was happy with the default settings, and I'd rather not spend hours to replicate the default settings as they used to be. So what changed this color scheme, and how do I get it back? The first picture shows color coding like it was, the second how it is now (I hate it).
Why do I often find the answer after days of searching, and then after posting the question to SO?
At Tools -> Options -> Text Editor -> C# -> Advanced scroll down to end, at "Editor Color Scheme" there is a combo box which was set to Visual Studio 2017. It should be Visual Studio 2019 to get the colors back.
I still don't understand why this automagically changed though.
Have you tried to disable "Use enhanced colors for C# and Basic" in Tools -> Options -> Text Editor -> C# -> Advanced?
For me there was an issue when I updated to version ~17.2.26. All the colors got blend and barely visible. Removing extensions, returning to default settings or safe mode changed nothing.
What helped was upgrade to 17.3. This applies to 2022, though.
Related
When I opened Visual Studio today, I observed there is a change in the background colour of the tabs, as shown in the picture.
How can I set it to the old/default color? Following Tools->Options, I didn't manage to find anything helpful.
You have the Productivity Power Tools extension installed, which, among other features, allows customizing the colors of tabs. The idea is that you can color tabs based either on the project with which they are associated and/or the language in which the file is written (which is implemented via the file extension).
These tab-coloring features are all part of the general "Custom Document Well" package, which provides a bunch of advanced customization options for the document tabs. If you don't want any of these, but use other features of Productivity Power Tools, then you can turn them off. Go to Tools → Settings → Productivity Power Tools, and then turn "off" Custom Document Well:
If you just want to disable the coloring and return the tabs to their default colors, then go to Tools → Settings → Productivity Power Tools → Custom Document Well, and uncheck both of the "Color tabs" checkboxes:
If you just don't like the default colors and want to change them, then you can do so by going to Tools → Settings → Productivity Power Tools → Custom Document Well → Color Coding:
There are other interesting options, too; be sure to explore! Personally, this is one of my favorite features because it allows me to distinguish between headers, C code, C++ code, assembly code, and resource files at a glance, making it easy to find the one I want to switch to. I can recognize colors a lot faster than I can read names. (The project coloring is less useful to me since I tend to work on only one project at a time, but I can see that being very useful, too, for the same reasons. Humans have evolved to distinguish color very quickly.)
Update: This is not available for Visual Studio 2019; see this Developer Community thread where support was requested by the community and subsequently denied by Microsoft.
Just FYI:
In Productivity Power Tools 2017 instead of Settings → Productivity Power Tools → Custom Document Well you should enable additional extension, that will be installed while Productivity Power Tools installation:
After that you will see tab for setting up colored tabs:
So if you want to disable colored tabs - just disable Custom Document Well extension
Update: This is not available for Visual Studio 2019.
Visual Studio 2022 give this feature out of the box.
Tools -> Options -> Environment -> Tabs and Windows -> Colorize document tabs by Project
As a shortcut you can directly change it from the text editor
Go to Tools -> Options
Click on font and colors in the left hand pane
Now either
you can USE DEFAULTS to reset the settings and try to customise your settings again.
or you can select the item from Show settings for dropdown.. find the tab colour in the one it shows in your dropdown. Change the font background colour
This may not be (most likely not) the correct StackExchange site, but I couldn't find the one that I thought would be more correct. If there is a better site just comment with it and I'll gladly delete this question and move it.
What I'm trying to achieve is getting color schemes added to the Color theme: drop down menu inside of Visual Studio's Options -> Environment -> General -> Visual experience. Is this possible? What is involved?
Very much possible, use the extension Visual Studio 2015 Color Theme Editor from Microsoft
I in visual studio go to Tools -> Options -> Environment -> Fonts and Colors -> VSCommands.FindResults.Match and change the Item foreground and Item background colors but they never show in my Find Results output window. I have closed visual studio, restarted my computer, etc. but it does not change. Anyone know how to force this change to take place?
I am evaluating Visual Studio 2012 and am having some problems with the color schema.
Sure enough I was able to overcome the initial discomfort by setting my color for the text editor.
One thing I have not been able to set corrent are the color for the class names.
Say you have a line like below.
Class name = new Class();
the entire line is in the same color, expect the new keyword.
I want the word 'Class' to be in a different color like in earlier versions of Visual Studio.
I am not able to set the color for this from the Option.
I have tried chaning color for all fields like plain text, literals, identifier, etc under
Tool -> Option -> Environment -> Font & Colors
but still I am not able to fix this.
I have also applied custome themes, those are also not helping.
I wouldn't want to install a productivity power tool for such basic preference right ??
Edit:
I'm on Windows 7 x64 and Visual Studio Professional 2012, Version 11.0.50727.1 RTMREL
The solution I found is a combination of the suggestions found in a mish mash of related threads:
Close Visual Studio and open the VS command prompt as an administrator. Navigate to the devenv.exe file (in Express versions it is titled something along the lines of *express.exe) usually located in C://Program Files (x86)/Microsoft Visual Studio 11.0/Common7/IDE.
Type devenv.exe /setup
Reopen Visual Studio. If everything is all colored now, great! If not, close the tabs and reopen them.
Performing all of step 3 is what has got my coloring to come back to normal.
Here is where I got the suggestions:
Visual Studio 2012 - Intellisense sometimes disappearing / broken
How can I get user type C# syntax highlighting working again in VS 2012 RC?
If you're using Productive Power Tools, go to => Tools -> Options -> Productive Power Tools. In main menu, TURN OFF the option: Colorized Parameter Help.
I solved my problem, I'm on Windows 8 Pro, Visual Studio 2012 Ultimate.
You're on the right track. Under Tools -> Options -> Environment -> Fonts and Colors, you want to change "User Types", first making sure at the top of the dialog that you are viewing the settings for the "Text Editor"
Although, by default with my install of Visual Studio 2012 these were already set, so you may want to try the "Use Defaults" button, unless you've made other changes that you want to keep.
go to the tools >Option click on enviroment navigation and click on import and export setting and copy the url and open directory from the url and delete all font and color file .which you got setting folder
The workaround provided by Donatas on Microsoft Connect works without having to turn off any option of Productivity Power Tools:
There is a workaround without turning off "Colorized Parameter Help".
Go to Tools > Options > Environment > Fonts and Colors in Display
items select "User Types (Value types)" click Custom next to Item
foreground color and in the color picker change Red, Green or Blue by
1, i.e. to make a custom color which basically looks the same. OK on
all the dialogs and problem solved.
There's a lot of new things going on in the Productivity Power Tools extensions, and I find that many of the new features come with very weird color combinations, that many times make the text completely illegible. I assume this is because I've previously set a dark theme for Visual Studio, and some, but not all, of the settings that affect the extension have been changed.
Are there any good dark themes out there that have been put together after the Productivity Tools Extension was published, that create a unified color theme for both VS and the extension features?
Clarification: This question is not about color schemes for code, such as those found at studiostyles. I'm talking about color schemes that apply to the development environment itself; toolboxes, menus, tooltips, windows, buttons...
Install the Visual Studio Color Theme Editor extension:
Make your own color scheme or try: The Dark Expression Blend Color Theme (preview below)
Once you have that, you'll want schemes for the text editor as well. This site has several, including the VS2012 "dark" theme implemented for VS2010.
There is a style that I've created based on dark style from VS 2015 to use on my VS 2010. You can download this style from Dark Style from VS 2015.
After download it, just import through menu Tools -> Import and Export Settings...
So, I tested above themes and found out none of them are showing proper color combination when using Productivity Power Tools in Visual Studio.
Ultimately, being a fan of dark themes, I created one myself which is fully supported from VS2005 to VS2013.
Here's the screenshot
Download this dark theme from here: Obsidian Meets Visual Studio
To use this theme go to Tools -> Import and Export Setting... -> import selected environment settings -> (optional to save current settings) -> Browse select and then Finish.
Not sure if any of these help, but this might get you started: http://studiostyles.info
I know that the site owner has been gradually adding functionality to allow support for new color assignments, so perhaps there's something there.
You can also try this handy online tool, which generates .vssettings file for you.
Visual Studio Color Theme Generator