Visual Studio 2019: Start Page instead of Start Window - visual-studio

Visual Studio introduced a blocking Start Window instead of a non-blocking Start Page.
Considering how extensible Visual Studio is, is there a way to have VS2019 display a non-blocking Start Page.
The new Start Window is quite annoying, less informative, displays all projects, not just solutions, pinning is not up to previous standards, and no additional information. Most annoying is the blocking aspect.
I am thinking that there is some sort of extension or setting that Microsoft has somewhere, which can re-enable the Start Page and disable the Start Window.
Alternatively if it is not possible, is it possible to just disable the start window and have the main application appear, when the app starts or when a user closes a solution/project?
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Another hope with this post is that Microsoft sees this request and maybe modifies their code and offers users an option at the start, much like color theme and default code set, as to whether they want app blocking or app non-blocking for the start area.

In Tools > Options > Environment > Startup > On startup, open: select "Empty environment".
Visual Studio will start without showing the modal Start Window.

Start Page on startup extension restores the traditional Start Page in VS 2019.
Start Page: Please give it back! and Make the Visual Studio 2019 start window non-modal are open issues concerning your other points.

Related

Web Publish Activity window is not maintained when closing and reopening Visual Studio 2022

I recently applied an update to Visual Studio Community 2022 (64-bit).
Current Version is 17.3.4
We still use Web Deploy for some legacy asp.net sites and the Web Publish Activity window is very useful for switching between dev and production environments.
After a recent Visual Studio upgrade I noticed that the Web Publish Activity window was not visible, so I reopened it via View -> Other Windows... and it appeared as expected in the lower window, as a new tab along with Output and Error List.
But after closing my project and reopening it, the Web Publish Activity window is missing again. I tested other windows like PowerShell and Bookmark Window and they ARE maintained after closing and reopening VS.
I also tried saving a new window layout with the Web Publish Activity window open and then reapplying that layout after a VS restart but that had no affect.
It is very annoying to have to go though multiple levels of the View menu to reopen this window every time I open this project.
Does anyone have any advice on how to keep this window locked/pinned?
Is Microsoft trying to "encourage" me to stop using this window?
If there is another way to quickly change between publish profiles that would be acceptable as well, but I cannot find one.
Thank you.
This may be a bug with this particular window (the fact that it doesn't stay pinned after closing Visual Studio that is).
Perhaps as a decent workaround you can at least assign a keyboard shortcut to open this window:
Go to Options → Environment → Keyboard
Filter down to "View.WebPublishAcitvity" or find it in the list
Create a keyboard shortcut of your liking by typing it in the circled red box and then click the Assign button:
After doing that, you should be able to use that shortcut to open the window much faster at least.

How to clear the output window in Visual Studio 2022 before each run automatically

I have a simple .NET Core 6 application, developed via Visual Studio Community 2022.
When I press the start button in the standard toolbar, it appends the logs in the output window.
If I want to distinguish the start point of the recent run in the log's lines, I must search in the console.
There is a button in the top corner of the output window for clearing the console before the next run.
My question is, is there any setting in Visual Studio that I can set, to clear this output window automatically in each run before starting logging?
Here's my cheat-to-win workaround. It's not exactly the same as clearing the output window but it sure gets rid of the noise.
Debug.WriteLine(string.Join(Environment.NewLine, Enumerable.Repeat(string.Empty, 100)));
In the past I would use the technique shown here EnvDTE80.DTE2 to do a legitimate Clear but apparently there's no support for System.Runtime.InteropServices.Marshal.GetActiveObject in net core as mentioned here .Net Framework but not for .Net Core

Greenshot does not work in Visual Studio

Anyone know why you cannot use Greenshot in Visual Studio? I hit the Screen Print button and it does not bring up the cross-hairs to drag my window size. Instead it just takes a plain windows screenshot. I looked for keyboard commands that might override it but didnt see anything at first glance. It works for every other program but not when Visual Studio is the active window.
It's because your visual studio is running in a higher level (permission wise) than your greenshot instance.
for a one time test, close Greenshot, and run it as administrator (right click on the file, run as administrator).
As a more permanent solution, you can just set the compatibility mode for the file to be run in admin mode, and then when it's started on start up it should capture your VS instances as well :).
Edit:
Just in case, you can easily figure out if anything else is wired to a shortcut by doing the following:

VS2013 disable Web Publish Activity windo

Is there a way to disable the Web Publish Activity window in Visual Studio 2013?
I couldn't find any options to disable that feature.
I have no directly solution for it. But I found workaroud: I tab it to the right sidebar and set autohide for it. So, now this window take minimum screen place and isn't shown during every publish:
If you click the little x in the Web Publish Activity window, it will go away!
I had the same problem on Visual Studio 2017.
Mine was over everything every time and completely unreactive. Not even its close button worked.
The way I get rid of it was: menu Window > Reset Window Layout

Visual Studio output window- what goes there and why?

Can someone please explain to me what goes to the Output window in VS? Where do the messages there come from and do they have other use other than for debbuging?
Thanks.
The Output window is a set of text panes that you can write to and read from. Visual Studio defines these built-in panes: Build, through which projects communicate messages about builds, and General, through which Visual Studio communicates messages about the integrated development environment (IDE). Projects receive a reference to the Build pane automatically through the IVsBuildableProjectCfg interface methods, and Visual Studio offers direct access to the General pane through the SVsGeneralOutputWindowPane service. In addition to the built-in panes, you can create and manage your own custom panes.
Output Window (Visual Studio SDK)
This panel shows the actual info, that is spit from your application to the console (no matter debug or run mode). Also building, rebuilding and cleaning your project is described as operations there.
Check F1 for more info ;)
By default it either shows output from the build process, or debugger output. You can use OutputDebugString to display text in the output window while debugging.
There's not much else you can do with it without using an Add-In for Visual Studio.

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