Useful Features of Visual Studio 2012
The focus of most of this chapter has been on using Visual Studio to create a simple application. It's now time to look at some of the less commonly recognized features of Visual Studio. These features include, but are not limited to, the following items.
When Visual Studio 2012 is first started, you configure your custom IDE profile. Visual Studio enables you to select either a language-specific or task-specific profile and then change that profile whenever you desire.
Configuration settings are managed through the Tools ⇒ Import and Export Settings menu option. This menu option opens a simple wizard, which first saves your current settings and then allows you to select an alternate set of settings. By default, Visual Studio ships with settings for Visual Basic, Web development, and C#, to name a few, but by exporting your settings you can create and share your own custom settings files.
The Visual Studio settings file is an XML file that enables you to capture all your Visual Studio configuration settings. This might sound trivial, but it is not. This feature enables the standardization of Visual Studio across different team members. The advantages of a team sharing settings go beyond just a common look and feel.
The Task List
The Task List is a great productivity tool that tracks not only errors but also pending changes and additions. It's also a good way for the Visual Studio environment to communicate information that the developer needs to know, such as any current errors. The Task List is displayed by selecting Task List from the View menu. It offers two views, Comments and User Tasks, and it displays either group of tasks based on the selection in the drop-down box that is part of this window.
The Comment option is used for tasks embedded in code comments. This is done by creating a standard comment with the apostrophe and then starting the comment with the Visual Studio keyword TODO. The keyword can be followed with any text that describes what needs to be done. Once entered, the text of these comments shows up in the Task List. Note that users can create their own comment tokens in the options for Visual Studio via Tools ⇒ Options ⇒ Environment ⇒ Task List. Other predefined keywords include HACK and UNDONE.
Besides helping developers track these pending coding issues as tasks, leveraging comments embedded in code results in another benefit. Just as with errors, clicking a task in the Task List causes the Code Editor to jump to the location of the task without hunting through the code for it. Also of note is that the Task List is integrated with Team Foundation Server if you are using this for your collaboration and source control.
The second type of tasks is user tasks. These may not be related to a specific item within a single file. Examples are tasks associated with resolving a bug, or a new feature. It is possible to enter tasks into the Task List manually. Within the Task List is an image button showing a red check mark. Pressing this button creates a new task in the Task List, where you can edit the description of your new task.
Server Explorer
As development has become more server-centric, developers have a greater need to discover and manipulate services on the network. The Server Explorer feature in Visual Studio makes working with servers easier. The Server Explorer enables you to explore and alter your application's database or your local registry values. For example, it's possible to fully explore and alter an SQL Server database.
If the Server Explorer hasn't been opened, it can be opened from the View menu. Alternatively it should be located near the control Toolbox. It has behavior similar to the Toolbox in that if you hover over or click the Server Explorer's tab, the window expands from the left-hand side of the IDE. Once it is open, you will see a display similar to the one shown in Figure 1.31. Note that this display has three top-level entries. The first, Data Connections, is the starting point for setting up and configuring the database connection. You can right-click on the top-level Data Connections node and define new SQL Server connection settings that will be used in your application to connect to the database. The Server Explorer window provides a way to manage and view project-specific database connections such as those used in data binding.
Figure 1.31 Server Explorer window
The second top-level entry, Servers, focuses on other server data that may be of interest to you and your application. When you expand the list of available servers, you have access to several server resources. The Server Explorer even provides the capability to stop and restart services on the server. Note the wide variety of server resources that are available for inspection or use in the project. Having the Server Explorer available means you don't have to go to an outside resource to find, for example, what message queues are available.
By default, you have access to the resources on your local machine; but if you are in a domain, it is possible to add other machines, such as your Web server, to your display. Use the Add Server option to select and inspect a new server. To explore the Event Logs and registry of a server, you need to add this server to your display. Use the Add Server button in the button bar to open the dialog and identify the server to which you would like to connect. Once the connection is made, you can explore the properties of that server.
The third top-level node, SharePoint Connections, enables you to define and reference elements associated with one or more SharePoint servers for which you might be creating solutions.
Class Diagrams
One of the features introduced with Visual Studio 2005 was the capability to generate class diagrams. A class diagram is a graphical representation of your application's objects. By right-clicking on your project in the Solution Explorer, you can select View Class Diagram from the context menu. Alternatively, you can choose to Add a New Item to your project. In the same window where you can add a new class, you have the option to add a new class diagram. The class diagram uses a .cd file extension for its source files. It is a graphical display, as shown in Figure 1.32.
Figure 1.32 A class diagram
Adding such a file to your project creates a dynamically updated representation of your project's classes. As shown in Figure 1.32, the current class structures for even a simple project are immediately represented when you create the diagram. It is possible to add multiple class diagrams to your project. The class diagram graphically displays the relationships between objects—for example, when one object contains another object or even object inheritance. When you change your source code the diagram is also updated. In other words, the diagram isn't something static that you create once at the start of your project and then becomes out-of-date as your actual implementation changes the class relationships.
More important, you can at any time open the class diagram, make changes to one or more of your existing objects, or create new objects and define their relationship to your existing objects, and when done, Visual Studio will automatically update your existing source files and create new source files as necessary for the newly defined objects.
As shown in Figure 1.32, the class diagram files (*.cd) open in the same main display area used for the Visual Studio UI designer and viewing code. They are, however, a graphical design surface that behaves more like Visio than the User Interface designer. You can compress individual objects or expose their property and method details. Additionally, items such as the relationships between classes can be shown graphically instead of being represented as properties.
In addition to the editing surface, when working with the Class Designer a second window is displayed. As shown at the bottom of Figure 1.32, the Class Details window is generally located in the same space as your Output, Tasks, and other windows. The Class Details window provides detailed information about each of the properties and methods of the classes you are working with in the Class Designer. You can add and edit methods, properties, fields, and even events associated with your classes. While you can't write code from this window, you can update parameter lists and property types. The Class Diagram tool is an excellent tool for reviewing your application structure.