Visual Studio 2010 Pro Power Tools

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Visual Studio 2010 Productivity Power Tools

A set of extensions to Visual Studio Professional (and above) which improves developer productivity.

• Document Well 2010 Plus
  One of the key pieces of feedback that we have received over several versions of Visual Studio is that users want to be able to customize the behaviour of their document tabs.  From the ordering of tabs to the position of the close buttons, user can now configure dozens of different options for their tabs.  Go to Tools -> Options -> Environment -> Document Tab Wellto configure these options as you prefer:
  • Tab Well UI
    • Scrollable tabs
      Maintain spatial consistency of the documents that are included in the document well.
    • Vertical tabs
      Document tabs are shown vertically, allowing you to fit more tabs than are normally visible when shown horizontally.
    • Pinned tabs
      Allows you to pin tabs to keep them always visible and available.
    • Show close button in tab well
      Similar to Visual Studio 2008, will show a close button in the document well that will close the active tab.
  • Tab Behavior
    • Remove tabs by usage order (LRU)
      When a new tab is inserted and existing tabs don't fit in the document well, instead of removing the tab at the end of the well it will remove the least recently used tab. This ensures that frequently used tabs are readily available.
    • Show pinned tabs in a separate row/column
      Pinning tabs can quickly cause you to run out of space for regular tabs. The option allows you to always show pinned tabs in a separate row (or column, if displayed vertically) from regular tabs.
  • Sorting
    • Sort tabs by project
      Tabs will be sorted by the project they belong to, thus keeping them always together in the document tab well.
    • Sort tabs alphabetically
      Tabs will be sorted alphabetically. When Sort By Project is turned on, tabs will be sorted first by project and then alphabetically.
    • Sort tab well dropdown alphabetically
      The drop down menu at the right end of the document well is sorted alphabetically. This option allows ordering as the tabs are laid out in the document well.
  • Tab UI
    • Color tabs according to their project or according to regular expressions
      This option permits tabs to be colored according to the project they belong to. This is particularly useful when sorting tabs by project, as it allows you to immediately identify different groups of project documents.
      You can also configure regular expressions and assign a color to each one. If the name of a tab matches the configured regular expression, it will be colored with the assigned color.
    • Miscellaneous options that modify tab UI
      • Show document/toolwindow icon in tab
      • Show close button in tab
      • Modify dirty indicator style
        This option allows you to select from a set of different dirty indicators that you might prefer over the asterisk.
      • Modify minimum and maximum tab size
        Allows you to modify minimum and maximum tab size. Try setting minimum and maximum sizes to the same value, and you will have evenly spaced tabs.
• Searchable Add Reference Dialog
  The new Add Reference dialog makes it faster and easier for you to find the reference that you are looking for and add it to your VB, C# or F# project.  From the Solution Explorer, simply right click on the References node, select the Add Reference command to see the updated Add Reference Dialog.
• Highlight Current Line
  As the resolution of monitors increases, it’s becoming more difficult to find the caret in the code editor.  The highlight current line extension makes it easy to find the caret by highlighting the line that the caret is on in the editor.  You can even configure the default colour by changing the setting for “Current Line (Extension)” and “Current Line Inactive (Extension)” in Tools Options Fonts & Colors.
• HTML Copy
  This extension provides support for the HTML Clipboard format when copying code from the editor.  This means that you’ll no longer have to go fix up the formatting of your code when you paste it into a TFS bug form or any other HTML based control.
• Triple Click
  It’s never been easier to select a line of code from the mouse by simple triple-clicking anywhere on the line.
• Fix Mixed Tabs
  Some developers prefer tabs, others prefer spaces, and nobody likes mixing tabs & spaces.  This extension promotes developer harmony by warning as they are open or save a file that has a mixture of tabs & spaces.  The information bar also provides an easy way to fix the file to suit your preference.
• Ctrl + Click Go To Definition
  This extension gives the editor a web browser by adding clickable hyperlinks to symbols in your code as you hold down the Ctrl key.
• Align Assignments
  This extension is useful for making your code a little more readable by aligning the assignments when you type Ctrl+Alt+] such that it takes this:
  
  And turns it into this:
  
  Please note: This may conflict with your formatting settings. E.g. in C# you will need to disable: Tools->Options->Text Editor->C#->Formatting->Spacing->"Ignore spaces in declaration statements"
• Colorized Parameter Help
  This extension improves consistency with the editor by applying syntax highlighting to the contents of the Parameter Help window for C# &VB.
• Move Line Up/Down Commands
  This extension maps the Alt+Up Arrow & Alt+Down Arrow keys such that they will move the current line of code or the selected lines up and down through the editor.
• Column Guides
  Since Visual Studio 2002, there has been a not so secret registry key which allowed user to draw a vertical line in the code editor.  This is very useful to remind developers that their full line of code or comments may not fit one a single screen. Thanks to this extension this feature has returned with UI configure it.  Simply place the cursor at the appropriate column and select Add Guideline from the context menu