The folders under my solution in the Solution Explorer window randomly expand. This happens everytime I load the project, and randomly as I use Visual Studio 2008. The behavior seems to have no real pattern, and it's like it has a mind of it's own. Any ideas on what I can do to keep behaving like you would imagine it should (expand/collapse only when the + or - is clicked on)?
Tools + Options, Projects and Solutions, General. "Track Active Item in Solution Explorer" option. Feature, not a bug.
Related
How do you extend Tabs in Visual Studio 2013? It would be handy to extend the Tabs so that you can selectively track an item in Solution Explorer by right clicking on a tab.
By default, Visual Studio will track active items in Solution Explorer via the setting: Tools > Options > Projects and Solutions > General > Track Active Item in Solution Explorer.
Having that turned on makes Solution Explorer jump around, and is consequently confusing on large projects, so I turn it off. But, what I'd like to be able to do, is right click on an open tab, and select a menu item to make Solution Explorer track and display that file's location in Solution Explorer. Basically it would be on-demand selective file tracking.
I know hovering over the tab, you can see the file path and locate it that way. What I would like is a quicker shortcut to displaying the file location in Solution Explorer.
If there is a plugin that already does this, please let me know and provide a link. Otherwise, I'd be interested in knowing how to do this myself. Thanks.
There is a button on the Solution Explorer toolbar Sync with Active Document and the corresponding command SolutionExplorer.SyncWithActiveDocument for keyboard binding.
I have all the projects in a solution folded, so you can't see their files in the Solution Explorer. And a file belonging to one of those projects open. Once I browse to that file pane, the project containing the file is automatically unfolded in the Solution Explorer.
Is there a way to avoid that automatic unfolding?
I'm not 100% sure what you're after, but in the VS 2010 options, under "Projects and Solutions/General" there is an option called "Track Active Item in Solution Explorer".
I've just tried unchecking that and, with a mutiple project solution all collapsed, when clicking into an open code file it doesn't open up the project in the solution window. Try that and see if it produces the result you're after.
Let me know if I've misunderstood your question though!
I am new to visual studio and I am experimenting around with some Windows Services. I have created two solutions and I would like to view both of them at once. Without having to click file->recent projects to switch back and forth.
Ideally this could take place in the solution explorer and just nest the projects, but I am only able to view one solution/project at a time there.
Is there anyway to view multiple solutions/projects in Visual Studio?
This is the way Visual Studio is designed: One solution, one Visual Studio (VS) instance.
Besides switching between solutions in one VS instance, you can also open another VS instance and open your other solution with that one. Next to solutions there are as you said "projects". You can have multiple projects within one solution and therefore view many projects at the same time.
There's a much easier (but not so obvious) way; right click on the Visual Studio icon in the taskbar, then right click on the application name in the popup menu, then click "Open". Windows will then open another instance where you can open another solution in.
If you have two separate solutions, then you cannot view them simultaneously in the same VS instance. However, you can open multiple instances of VS and tab between them.
An alternative would be to import the projects from one solution into the other, thus putting all of your projects into one solution. You can do this by following these steps:
In the Solution Explorer, select the Solution into which you want to import a project. Right-click, and select Add->Existing Project from the context menu.
In the file chooser, find the project file that you want to import (it will end in .XXproj where XX is the language you're using).
Click Open and voila! Your project is imported.
There is a way to store multiple solutions in one instance of VS.
Attempt the following steps:
File > Open > Project/Solution
This will bring up the open project window, notice at the bottom where it says options, select add to solution
Then select the file you want to add and click open
This will then add the solution to your project. You still won't be able to run the same project in a single instance of VS, but you can have all your code organized in one place.
NOTE:
This worked for Visual Studio 2013 Professional
Just right click on the Visual Studio icon and then select "New Window" from the contextual toolbar that appears on the bottom in Windows 8. A new instance of Visual Studio will launch and then you can open your second project.
You can create a new blank solution and add your different projects to it.
You can have multiple projects in one instance of Visual Studio. The point of a VS solution is to bring together all the projects you want to work with in one place, so you can't have multiple solutions in one instance. You'd have to open each solution separately.
Don't know whether this is useful but if you want to work with multiple projects without navigating through projects tree {like multi window} you can try opening VS in another virtual desktop (at least it's possible for Windows 10) by holding Ctrl+win+D. Then open another VS studio and open your other project there. You can switch between projects by Ctrl+win+arrow key {left/right}.
Two ways come to mind...
Open another visual studio window and open the second solution in it.
It would be preferable to add your existing projects to one solution, just right click and add existing project and navigate to the project file(csproj). .... e.g. C:\Users\User\Documents\Visual Studio 2012\Projects\MySqlWindowsFormsApplication1\MySql Windows Forms Project1\MySql Windows Forms Project1.csproj ....In this second way you might want to setup multiple start up projects i.e. for people with client-server apps or apps with dependencies. ....To do this Select the solution then GoTo: Project>>Properties>>Startup Project>> Select Multiple Startup projects and set actions to Start. When you debug, the selected as start will run.
For interest sake you could open another multiple solution windows to view different projects at the same time. http://www.schwammysays.net/visual-studio-2012-tip-multiple-solution-explorers/
After a long research and different experiments the easiest way "FOR MAC USERS" is to create a script:
open -a "Visual Studio" \
"path to first sln" \
"path to second sln" \
...
:D
File -> New Window. Select the other project in that window. Each project lives in a separate window. You can tab between them.
MAC users - this issue was winding me up, as its not possible to open two different Visual Studio instances at the same time. Ive found a solution that works fine, though its a little unorthodox : get the latest beta testing version, which will install alongside your normal VS install in a separate sandbox (it does this automatically). You can then run both versions side by side, which is enough for what I needed - to be able to examine one project for structure, code etc., while doing the actual coding I need to do in the 'current' VS install instance.
Normally, many files in Visual Studio 2010 are opened in many tabs, while massively working on a project. Many times, I find myself right-clicking on a tab title and searching for Show/Select/Scroll-to this file in Solution Explorer, and I can't find it.
Is there a way to automatically select an opened file in Solution Explorer?
Another option is to bind 'View.TrackActivityInSolutionExplorer' to a keyboard short-cut, which is the same as 'Tools-->Options-->Projects and Solutions-->Track Active Item in Solution Explorer'
If you activate the short-cut twice the file is selected in the solution explorer, and the tracking is disabled again.
Visual Studio 2013+
There is now a feature built in to the VS2013 solution explorer called Sync with Active Document. The icon is two arrows in the solution explorer, and has the hotkey Ctrl + [, S to show the current document in the solution explorer. Does not enable the automatic setting mentioned above, and only happens once.
I don't know if you can do it on-demand, but you can enable the option "Track Active Item in Solution Explorer" (Tools->Options->Projects and Solutions->General) which will always select the active tab item in the solution explorer.
If you're using the ReSharper plugin, you can do that using the Shift + Alt + L shortcut or navigate via menu as shown.
This isn't exactly what you're looking for, but it would automatically select the "active" file in the Solution Explorer:
Tools-->Options-->Projects and Solutions-->Track Active Item in Solution Explorer.
simply Tools--> Options--> Projects and Solutions--> Track Active Item in Solution Explorer
The best option now is to install the Microsoft Visual Studio add on called Productivity Power Tools.
With this comes "Solution Navigator" (alternative to Solution Explorer, with a lot of benefits) - which then you can use to filter the files to only show "Open". You can even filter files to show "Edited" and "Unsaved".
It's in VS2012 - Specifically the 2-Arrow icon at the top of the solution explorer (Left/Right arrows, one above the other). This automatically jumps to the current file.
This icon is only visible if you've got Track Active Item in Solution Explorer disabled.
In Visual Studio 2012, the same can be done using the "Sync With Active Document" option in Solution Explorer
In VS 2019 select Tools > Options and then tick "Track Active Item in Solution Explorer"
The Tab Studio plugin adds "select in solution explorer" to the right click menu on tabs.
I've put in a feature request for this very feature. Although I know this isn't an answer in itself it is a step in the direction of being able to get this feature implemented. Any votes it it may help to get Microsoft's attention.
As far as I'm aware of though there is no way to do this other than possibly writing a macro or creating your own add-in/extension to Visual Studio.
There's a very nice extension to VS2010, which does exactly this: Solution Explorer Tools.
This extension adds a button which selects the current file in the solution explorer, as well as convenient buttons for collapsing and expanding projects.
That's the screenshot of the answer for your question.
In visual studio 2022
Similar to this answer https://stackoverflow.com/a/8473574/13275637
You need to tick Track Active Item in solution Explorer
I've been using Visual Studio for a long time and the constant shuffling of the code tabs at the top drives me bonkers. I was wondering if there were any add-ins that might change this or other UI behavior.
Things that might be cool:
Sticky Tabs that won't go away.
Multi-code file collapsible tabs (maybe each tab being a project?).
Having the solution tree go to the file you are currently looking at automatically. Thanks Omlette!
Your idea here.
I've done a bit of googling and haven't been able to find anything useful.
The "Having the solution tree go to the file you are currently looking at automatically" feature already exists in VS2008, but isn't enabled by default. Go to tools -> options -> projects and solutions -> general and check the "Track Active Item in Solution Explorer" box.
Rick,
Tabs Studio add-in for Visual Studio is a replacement for built-in tabs. Multiple rows of tabs make them always visible. Tabs can be grouped, it is probably close to what you call "multi-code file tabs".
See Tabs Studio home page for more information.