Archive for January, 2007
AnkhSVN 1.0 released (Subversion plug-in for Visual Studio)
AnkhSVN 1.0 has been released!
If you use Visual Studio 2003 or 2005 and are currently either using the TortoiseSVN shell extension (or Subversion command line) then you would do well to see just how much more productive having source-control available from within the IDE can be.
Thanks go to Arild and mac|gyver for all their hard work on this great open source project.
Hope you enjoy my icons too!
[)amien
How to spot a Visual Studio 2005 SP1 installation
If like me you have a couple of machines, a few virtual machines and secondary installations such as Express editions (for XNA of course) you can easily loose track of which have been patched with service pack 1. Especially if you also messed around with the SP1 beta.
Help > About from Visual Studio 2005 can tell us – cryptically…
No service pack – Version 8.0.50727.42 (RTM.050727-4200)
Service pack 1 beta – Version 8.0.50727.363 (SP.050727-3600)
Service pack 1 – Version 8.0.5727.762 (SP.050727-7600)
Thanks to Rikkus and Gringod for providing their about dialogs!
Burge points out that clicking Show updates inside Add/Remove Programs reveals the SP1 update nested beneath Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 xxx Edition – although it doesn’t tell you if you still have the beta installed.
[)amien
Eight things I hate about Visual Studio 2005
Whilst Visual Studio is quite a capable IDE it isn’t perfect – here is my personal top 10 list of things I hate about it. I’ve kept the gripes to the IDE itself – the issues I have with .NET Framework deserve a post of their own some time.
1. Go To Definition does not work between languages
Sometimes your solution has to be a mixed language one – you know the odd VB.Net class library that nobody wants to rewrite in C#.
Hit Go To Definition on a call to this library however and you won’t find yourself there in the VB.Net code – oh no it’s straight to the Object Browser for you.
2. IntelliSense ignores aliased name spaces
Name spaces were introduced to help reduce name collisions but occasionally you need to use both classes with the same name. You get two choices in .NET – you can either fully-qualify them making your code incredibly verbose and difficult to scan through or you can use an aliased name space – e.g. using SNM = System.Net.Mime;
Annoyingly IntelliSense will always use the fully qualified name even if you start with the alias. Typing SNM.ContentType content = new will trigger off IntelliSense to unhelpfully suggest System.Net.Mime.ContentType().
3. Dependent-upon project items aren’t usefully exposed
.NET 2 brought partial classes to the table and Visual Studio made a stab at using them for the Form designers by sticking the generated code in a .Designer file that nests below the file in the Solution Explorer.
This is achieved by the .Designer file gaining a <DependentUpon> tag to link it to its owner. If you want to use this for your own generated files you’d better get used to editing project files in Notepad because the IDE won’t help.
4. The SDK/AddIn API is awful
If you feel like addressing any of the shortcomings in Visual Studio you can extend it using their SDK which allows you to write your own AddIn – providing you can get your head around the most obscure and awful API ever.
5. Not all project types support automation
Some of the less popular project types (e.g. Database) don’t support the parts of the automation API they are supposed to.
This means if you’ve managed to get your head around the SDK you now find all your hard efforts don’t always work.
6. The syntax editor does not support italics
Why oh why doesn’t the syntax editor support being able to italicise a font? I’d much prefer my comments displayed in italics. If Borland’s Delphi supported it in the 90′s why can’t Visual Studio 10 years later?
My Envy Code R programming font fakes italics for use within Visual Studio!
7. Document tab area doesn’t like staying still
The document tab at the top of the screen is where you switch between the various documents. The only problem is it jumps up and down depending on how many tool bars as standard the designer/editor for that file type has so you switch once and then end up hitting a random tool bar button if you quickly decide to move on to another file.
8. No re-distributable elements
Want to put syntax highlighting in your product? Better go buy some third-party components.
Visual Studio style docking? Third party-component.
Sure you can licence the basic Visual Studio IDE for your own languages and code – providing you have very deep pockets.
Wrapping it up
I’ve downloaded the January CTP of Orcas but I doubt it will address any of my bug-bears.
What would be cool is an open-source IDE for .NET development written in .NET that exposes the syntax highlighter and parser trees with a much better plug-in system and the Office 2007 style ribbon.
I wonder how the SharpDevelop guys are getting on…
[)amien
Five things you didn’t know about me
I’ve watched this go round all the .NET development blogs I read but alas none of them tagged me.
This in fact turned out to be a bit of a blessing because now that Alex has tagged me I suddenly found I couldn’t think of five things nobody knew about me.
So here are five things you may or may not have known.
- I learnt to simultaneously program on the Sinclair ZX Spectrum and the Acorn BBC Micro at age 11. Both originally in BASIC then later in Z80 and 6502 assembly respectively – I guess I’ve always been platform independent ;-)
- I was the first Internet Service Provider in the Channel Islands providing free Internet e-mail via my Black Ice BBS a few years before Guernsey.Net and Local Dial formed.
- I want to build my dream-home in British Columbia, Canada in a small-town a few hours away from Vancouver. Now I’ve passed my degree I have enough points to emigrate without needing to find a job before I go…
- I accidentally set fire to my kitchen last year. I was out of the house when I got a phone call and upon returning home found the place full of firemen. Whilst the kitchen needed major work everything else was ok and even better the owners insurance paid up for the damage.
- I’m very lucky in most areas of my life – from little things like finding parking spaces and things I want to landing good jobs and surviving what should be serious accidents with minor scrapes. Alas the luck doesn’t extend to relationships.
I’ll tag Gringod, Steve, Wilco, Arild and Swoo.
[)amien