When I want to edit C# Unity scripts, they open in Visual Studio. It is supposed to provide auto complete for all Unity related code, but it doesn't work.
Here you can see the missing functionality:
As seen, the transform object does not open the autocomplete menu.
Unity version: 5.5.2f1
Visual studio 2015
Visual Studio Tools for Unity is installed
There is no auto-completion because the script says "Miscellaneous Files" instead of the of the name of the Project. Take a look at the image below that came from the video in your question:
The "Miscellaneous Files" message can happen for many reasons:
It can happen when you open your Unity C# file from another folder instead of opening it from Unity Editor.
This can also happen because Unity crashed while Visual Studio is still open therefore corrupting some files.
It can happen because Unity was closed then re-opened but is no longer connected to Visual Studio. When Visual Studio is opened you get "Miscellaneous Files" and no auto-completion.
This can happen when Visual Studio Tools for unity is not installed.
When you create a script from Unity then quickly open it before Unity finish processing it or before the round icon animation stuff finish animating.
Most of the times, restarting Unity and Visual Studio should fix this.
I can't tell which one is causing the problem but I will cover the most likely solution to fix this.
Fix Part 1:
Download and Install Visual Studio Tools for unity from this link. Do this while Unity and Visual Studio are both closed.
From Unity Editor, go to Edit → Preferences... → External Tools. On the External Script Editor drop down menu, change that to Visual Studio 2015.
Fix Part 2:
If newly created C# files are coming up as Miscellaneous then follow the instruction below:
From Visual Studio, go to Tools → Options... → Tools for Unity → Miscellaneous. Under Show connectivity icon, set it to true then restart Visual Studio.
When you re-start, connection icon should now be available in Visual Studio. Click it then choose the Unity instance to connect to. The red 'x' icon should now turn into a brown checkmark icon. Now, when you create a new C# file in Unity, it should open without saying Miscellaneous.
Fix Part 3:
Still not fixed?
Re-import project then open C# Project.
Close Visual Studio.
From Unity, re-import project by going to Assets → Reimport All.
Now, open the project in Visual Studio by going to Assets → Open C# Project. This will reload the project and fix possible solution file problems.
Fix Part 4:
Still not fixed?
Fix each C# file individually.
Click on Show All Files icon.
Select the script that doesn't do auto-complete then right-click and select Include In Project.
Fix Part 5:
Not fixed yet?
Credit goes to chrisvarnz for this particular solution which seems to have worked for multiple people.
Close Visual Studio
Go your project directory and delete all the generated Visual Studio files.
These are the files extensions to delete:
.csproj
.user
.sln
Example:
Let's say that the name of your Project is called Target_Shoot, these are what the files to delete should look like:
Target_Shoot.csproj
Target_Shoot.Editor.csproj
Target_Shoot.Editor.csproj.user
Target_Shoot.Player.csproj
Target_Shoot.Player.csproj.user
Target_Shoot.sln
Do not delete anything else.
Double click on the script again from Unity which should generate new Visual Studio file then open Visual Studio. This may solve your problem.
Fix Part 6:
If not working, check if you are having this error:
The "GetReferenceNearestTargetFrameworkTask" task was not found
Install Nuget PackageManager from here.
Restart Visual Studio.
See this answer for more information.
Fix Part 7
Make sure all of the projects are loaded.
In Solution Explorer it should tell you # of # projects.
If all of the projects are not showing, right click on "Solution (# of # projects)" and click Load Projects.
Try this,
In Unity Editor Go to Menu, Click on Edit -> Preferences -> External Tools -> External Script Editor. Set it to Visual Studio (your installed version of VS).
Now in Menubar go to Edit -> Project Settings -> Player Settings -> Other Settings -> Under Configuration -> Check API Compatibility Level -> Change it to your installed .Net version. In my case I set it to .Net 4.x
Now if Visual Studio is running already go to Visual Studio, it will ask to reload project. Reload the project. Check if it works, if not close Visual Studio. Now Open cs file from Unity Editor, and now it should work.
I found another way to fix this issue in a more convenient manner:
Select the broken file in Solution Explorer.
Open its Properties.
Switch field "Build Action" from "Compile" to "None".
Then switch it back to "Compile".
This will kill the synchronization between Unity and Visual Studio somehow.
The next time Visual Studio will reload the project, it will prompt a warning.
Just click on "Discard".
If you have done all of the above and still isn't working , just try this:
Note: you should have updated VS.
Goto Unity > edit> preference >External tools> external script editor.
Somehow for me I had not selected "visual studio" for external script editor and it was not working. As soon as i selected this and doubled clicked on c# file from unity it started working.
I hope it helps you too.
Unload and reload the project, in Visual Studio:
right click your project in Solution Explorer
select Unload Project
select Reload Project
Fixed!
I found this solution to work the best (easiest), having run into the problem multiple times.
Source: https://alexdunn.org/2017/04/26/xamarin-tips-fixing-the-highlighting-drop-in-your-xamarin-android-projects/
This page helped me fix the issue.
Fix for Unity disconnected from Visual Studio
In the Unity Editor, select the Edit > Preferences menu.
Select the External Tools tab on the left.
For External Script Editor, Choose the Visual Studio version you have.
Click regenerate Files
You Done
Select project in Visual Studio
Click "Refresh" button
I hit the same issues today using Visual Studio 2017 15.4.5 with Unity 2017.
I was able to fix the issue by right clicking on the project in Visual Studio and changing the target framework from 3.5 to 4.5.
Hope this helps anyone else in a similar scenario.
Two Alternative Options:
Fix 1
#singleton pointed me in this direction. Instead of changing the target in Visual Studio you should change it in Unity since the project is auto-generated.
First delete the auto generated Visual Studio files:
.csproj
.user
.sln
Then from within Unity go to PlayerSettings and under 'Other Settings' change the 'Scripting Runtime Version' from Stable 3.5 to Experimental 4.6.
However, that didn't fix it for me.
Fix 2
I noticed all of the references to Unity related code was marked with a yellow warning. Check your error logs and see if this is the case. In particular see if you get the following error: getreferenceNearestTargetframeworkTask
If so try:
Start Visual Studio Installer again.
On the Build Tools 2017, click Modify,
Ensure that "Nuget targets and build tasks" are ticked. This should become ticked if you click on Universal Windows Platform development.
Update 2020 with Visual Studio Community 2019 and Unity 2019.3:
Open Visual Studio Installer as Administrator, select to modify your current installation and add "Game development for Unity"
If you add a new c# script in Unity now, and open it (automatically) with Visual Studio, it is not described as "Miscellaneous" at the top of the window but with "Assembly-CSharp", and the autocomplete works.
i found my solution by creating the .cs file from visual studio itself instead of unity editor
right click on project folder in solution explorer
add > new item
type "unity" on the search field on the top right
select "CSharp MonoBehaviour"
name your script on the bottom and click Add
In my case, correct .net version was not installed on my PC. I install the .net 3.5 on my pc and that worked for me.
For Windows or macOS:
Download/Install the Visual Studio IDE (with Unity Tools)
When installing, make sure you include installation of
Game development with Unity
Then using Unity (you can double click one of your C# files), open a new C# project and the Visual Studio IDE should open with your new project structure.
From there, you should be able to see what you are looking for.
For example:
For Linux (suggestion):
Try Monodevelop - Additional Information, it provides code completion/hints.
My autocomplete also didn't work because Visual Studio Tools for Unity wasn't installed. So, after you install that, delete the auto generated Visual Studio files. Others said that you open file again and the problem is solved but it's not.
The trick is: instead of normally double-clicking the file, you need to open the C# file from Unity by right click and then "Open C# Project".
The issue I faced was that the C# Project was targeting a different .NET Framework (4.7.2), whereas the Unity project had a different target (.NET 3.5).
I fixed this by changing the target in Unity as-
File -> Build Settings -> Player Settings -> Other Settings -> API
Compatibility Level : Set it to the .NET version you already have
installed (Check your .NET Version here). In my case, it was 4.x
After this, Visual Studio worked perfectly and autocorrect was fixed too.
Try pressing Ctrl + Alt + Space (which toggles between suggestion and standard completion modes)
For some odd reason, the "Game development with Unity" tool can become disabled in Visual Studio.
To fix this..
Open Visual Studio
Go to Extensions → "Manage Extensions" → Installed
Find "Visual Studio 2019 Tools for Unity"
If it is disabled, enable it
Restart VS
Credit to Yuli Levtov's answer on another Thread
The following works for me.
Go to Edit->Preferences->External Tools->External Script Editor Select Scripting Editor
I solved to install the same version of .NET on WIN that was configured in my Unity project. (Player Settings)
Go to Options on the Tools menu and then select Documents in the Environment node. (If Documents does not appear in the list, select Show all settings in the Options dialog box.)
Put a tick on "Miscellaneous files in Solution Explorer" and Click OK. (This option displays the "Miscellaneous Files" node in Solution Explorer. Miscellaneous files are files that are not associated with a project or solution but can appear in Solution Explorer for your convenience if you tick this option.)
Locate your file in the Solution Explorer under "Miscellaneous Files". Then drag and drop your file to where it should belong and voila! This will copy the file to where you drop it. You may now safely delete the older file under Miscellaneous Files folder if you wish to do so
Credits: https://stackoverflow.com/a/47662523/10471480
In case Scripts folder is not visible:
Click on "Show all files" in Solution Explorer
Locate the Scripts folder.
Right Click on Scripts and select "Include in Project"
Keep in mind that if you are using the ReSharper tool, it will override the IntelliSense and show it's own. To change that, on VS, go to Extensions -> ReSharper -> Options -> IntelliSense -> General then choose Visual Studio and not ReSharper.
Before restarting and/or re-installing VS, First try opening any other of your projects to see if Intellisence works, if it does, then issue probably lies with your current project. First, most probable victim would be the NUGET packages with pending updates. To Fix this,
Right click on references
Proceed to Manage NUGET Packages Under NUGET Packages
proceed to updates Install Updates and recheck Intellisence
I tried all of these but ended up finding out that I needed to right-click the solution in Solution Explorer and add existing items and find the C# assembly file in Window's Explorer. There seem to be a bazillion different problems that give you this error, this is likely the most simple solution. If you double click on your script from unity, it does not seem to drag the assembly along.
Another possible fix:
In the project window, click on the Assets folder
Right click, and Create -> C# Script
Double click that, and wait.
For some reason, this work.
None of the above solutions worked for me. However I opened the ProjectName.CSPROJ file and manually added the new file and it worked like charm
What worked me is that I copied all the code inside the broken class and removed that file.
Then, I opened an empty file with the same name and pasted back.
Result: beautiful syntax highlights came back!
"Preferences" -> "External tools" -> set you exteranl tool
Thats one fix. Also for VS you can use ReSharper by JetBrains, but I recommend use Rider. That one is also free for students.
It provides less performance than visual studio, but more than VS+Resharper definitely.
Have a good day, mate)
Try with combination: Ctrl + Alt + Space
one of the above methods are worked for me and I just found a solution to this problem,
1. First, go to the project directory and delete .sln file
2. Second, go to unity and double click your script. Then Visual Studio will be open with an error,
Then click ok and close Visual Studio editor.
Finally, turn off your Windows Defender and then go to your project directory and there will be .csproj file. Just double click and open this from your Visual Studio editor and open the scripts folder inside the assets folder and open the scripts and autocompletion will be working perfectly fine.
These actions solved the problem for my projects in Visual Studio 2022
FIX 1
Solution
Assembly-CSharp (right-click)
Load Entire Dependency Tree
FIX 2
Solution
Assembly-CSharp
References
Double click on any lib to force loading
I am using visual studio 2015. I have my toolbox open and I checked on Show All. I unchecked this an now my entire toolbox is empty except for the General Tab (which there is nothing in). I tried resetting the toolbox but that did not fix the problem. Has anyone encountered this before? If so, what was the fix? Thanks.
Try right clicking in the toolbox and select 'show all'... I hope this help. =)
you can also start /reset
Thank you for posting.
Could you please capture some screenshots for me?
From your description, it seems that your issue might be related with IDE. I suggest you to try to execute the following command.
Devenv.exe /SafeMode
Devenv.exe /ResetSettings
If you have any concern, please feel free to let me know.
Best Regards,
I just had the same thing happen to me in Visual Studio 2022 with a .NET 6 WinForms application. After updating VS 2022 to version 17.2.0, my Toolbox entries were blank when I tried to use them to drag and drop into the designer of a project I had just recently created in version 17.1.x.
I ended up fixing this by:
Right-click the Toolbox
Select Choose Items from the resulting context menu
Press the Reset button in the resulting Choose Toolbox Items dialog
Press the OK button when the reset process completed.
I have that problem still after using repair in VisualStudio Instaler. But find solution her : https://thinkaboutit.be/2012/10/my-toolbox-is-empty/
. The localization off that files can be in diffrent places, for VS 2022 i find her: C:\Users\YourUserName\AppData\Local\Microsoft\VisualStudio\17.0_dbab3d69
That files are hiden.
I had the same problem. I have tried with right click on the design windows and add " Toolbox" (SSIS Toolbox in my case). This worked for me.
In the case of an SSIS toolbox not appearing. On the top ribbon menu click on View -> Other Windows -> SSIS Toolbox, this will show the toolbox with SSIS related items.
SSIS Menu image
I had a similar problem(Visual Studio 2022). None of the solutions solved my problem. Eventually my problem was solved by repairing the visual studio.
Go to Start >> All Programs >> “Visual Studio 2022” >> “Visual Studio Installer”. Now, click Visual Studio Installer.
After clicking repair options progress options open. The repair will take some minutes to complete.
I encountered the same problem and solved it by:
closing the toggled/opened toolbox
opening any windows form [designer]
re-opening the toolbox
toolbox components will be reloaded again
I don't know why this bug exists, but I fixed mine using the steps below:
Right click on toolbox -> Show All -> Check.
Wait it to load the controls, then click OK
Rigth click on Toolbox and select -> Show All -> Uncheck
This is an old question but I could fix it easily by just stopping the program running.
If you run your app to test it the toolbox will be empty until you stop the debugger!
In my case, I had opened with ctrl+alt+x. I noticed in the newer versions of VS, there is some confused crossover of toolboxes. In my case, it opened the SSRS toolbox, which was not applicable to my SSIS file.
Closed that, right-clicked in design area, and chose SSIS Toolbox. This opened a toolbox called "SSIS Toolbox" rather than just "Toolbox". All fixed.
I just right-clicked on toolbox area and choose "show all" :) Now it works
Just restart visual studio and it will pop right back
In Visual Studio 2019 you can just right click the dark area inside the toolbox and select "Reset Toolbox".
This will remove custom-added controls or any other auto-detected control, and you will be left only with the standard controls.
The issue should be fixed without completely reseting Visual Studio's settings.
First of all, they took away the default setup project and give us a 3rd party tool to package ( maybe its a topic for a separate forum), but visual studio keeps opening a new tab with the flexera customer support page(with an irritating javascript error) whenever i have a 'error' in my code .
how can i disable this feature ?
As a workaround, you can go to Solution Properties -> Configuration Properties -> and uncheck the Build action for the setup Project (then close and reopen visual studio).
Later you reactivate it only when setup creation is required.
Another workaround.
Right-click on setup project and choose Unload Project.
When you want to build setup again, use Reload Project.
Not a solution, but another workaround. Edit your hosts file and point that website to localhost. Gets rid of the popups, but not the extra tab in Visual Studio.
1) Run this:
notepad C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc\hosts
2) Add this text and save the file:
# To get rid of the annoying javascript error popups in Visual Studio
# Example problem URL: http://flexerasoftware.force.com/SupportKBList?searchString=-1014
127.0.0.1 flexerasoftware.force.com
3) Run this:
ipconfig /flushdns
4) Close re-open Visual Studio.
My favorite workaround (10 seconds but must be re-done after each VS2013 restart):
1) Right click the tab and click [Float]
2) Minimize the window and put it in an unused corner of VS 2013
If I click control-click a hyperlink in the text editor, it opens the URL in a new Visual Studio tab. I would rather the link open outside Visual Studio in my system's default web browser (happens to be Google Chrome). How can I arrange this?
I'm talking about hyperlinks in code comments.
I am using Visual Studio 2012. I found a similar question dated 2009, however the accepted answer (a macro) doesn't work in Visual Studio 2012.
Frustratingly, this isn't possible in Visual Studio 2012 or 2013.
Bug reported to developers at http://visualstudio.uservoice.com/forums/121579-visual-studio/suggestions/2723548-open-links-in-an-actual-browser Please add your vote!
There is an extension Open in External Browser.
I'm using Visual Studio 2013 Professional. It works for me.
To install:
Go to "Tools" - "Extension and Updates..."
Choose "Online" - "Visual Studio Gallery" on left pane
Type in search field "open in external browser"
Click "Install"
It seems that it is not possible (except if your default browser is IE, so you would not know the difference).
As Anand wrote above, you could ctrl + right click on the link and then select open link in external window (you cannot do that on the start page, only on an opened webpage) but it still opens the window in IE no matter what your default browser is.
Even if you go to TOOLS --> Options --> Environment --> Web Browser, you will notice that it indicated that IE and the internal VS web browser are siblings.
So just copy the URL from the address bar and paste it to your default browser (it's not too much trouble in my opinion).
In VS 2012 Professional, on the toolbar next to the run debug icon, is the word 'Start' which can be expanded. When expanded you have the option to 'Open with...' and you can select the browser to open the web project up in. It does not run the debugger, it only opens the website in the selected browser. (toolbar > Start (expanded) > Open with...)
You can use the default browser switcher application if you are using Visual Studio 2010 for this kind of situation:
On your tool bar menu select "TOOLS"
Then from options choose "EXTENSION Manager"
It will open the extension manager window in the left hand side there are options choose the "Online Gallery" option
In Online Gallery search for "WoVS Default Browser Switcher"
Download it and Install it
After download restart VS
Hope this works best for you
I found a way to change the default browser for all actions in Visual Studio Express 2012 for Web. It's documented here:
By default, Visual Studio uses your default browser to test pages. To use a different browser or Page Inspector, right-click [an .aspx] page in [the] Solution Explorer and then click [...] Browse With [, which] lets you select a browser from a list, add new browsers to the list, or set one as the default browser. (The default browser setting here applies only to the Visual Studio environment and not to Windows.)
This also changes the default browser for F5'ing an MVC project, because I'm used to closing IE to stop debugging. When I let Visual Studio use my system's default browser, I first have to switch back to it from my browser to stop debugging, because closing the browser tab doesn't.
Unfortunately it still doesn't open links in comments in a browser.
I don't actually know what you mean under hyperlink, but you can easily make VS2012 working with another browser by simply.. uninstalling IE9 (Control Panel->Software->Windows components->bye bye IE9).
Well I found a workaround that is not so clean :P
Add a .html file to your project
Open the new .html file and click inside the editor.
Now Goto 'File' > 'Browse With...' from the Visual Studio Top Menu.
In the 'Browse With' Window, select the desired browser and click
the 'Set as Default' button.
Click the Browse button to set the new default selection.
This is what you have to do:
Go to the standard menu toolbar
Click on 'Add or Remove Buttons'
Tick the 'Debug Target' option
VS 2012 -->> File -->> Browse With -- >> Select Browser -->> Click on "set Default" Button -->> Now Click "Browse" Button
Go thru this setting...
Hope this will help you