Visual Basic Tools for Visual Studio 2017

22 New Tools and Extensions for Visual Studio 2017

Summer is coming to a close, and there's a new class of Visual Studio tools and extensions available specifically for the latest release, Visual Studio 2017.

The extensibility of Visual Studio and the huge community of developers sharing tools and extensions means there'due south always something new to try or a amend solution to a daily coding irritation. Here's a roundup of the latest contributions to the Visual Studio Marketplace specifically for Visual Studio 2017. The vast bulk of these tools and extensions are free and created by developers just similar you.

Final Tricks
Having access to a command-line interpreter during application evolution can be a lifesaver, whether you're running commands, using command-line Git, deploying builds, or even managing remote servers and services. Of course yous can Alt+Tab to a divide command-prompt window, merely why bother if you lot tin can have the same sudo powers right in Visual Studio 2017....

Whack Whack Terminal, by Daniel Griffen, is a new extension that provides a terminal emulator as a tab in Visual Studio 2017 (see Effigy 1). The "Whack Whack" proper noun comes from the default keystrokes to enable the final: Ctrl+\, Ctrl+\. As I'g writing this, the available release defaults to a PowerShell command prompt. However, one time you're in the terminal, y'all can employ Windows command prompts, PowerShell cmdlets, or invoke a Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) Bash prompt. Settings to configure the default interpreter are scheduled for an upcoming release.

**[Click on prototype for larger view.]** *Figure 1.* Whack Whack Concluding Lets Y'all Open up a PowerShell Control Prompt in Visual Studio

BuiltinCmd, past Lky Tal, provides only Windows command prompt support in a Visual Studio tab. Nonetheless, the developer has been updating regularly and the extension supports Visual Studio 2013 through 2017. PowerShell support is on the roadmap!

Now, if you want to contain support for terminal sessions into your application rather than your IDE, at that place are a couple choices bachelor.

ComponentPro offers 30-day trial editions for its Telnet Component/Command and .Net SSH Vanquish Telnet, Terminal Control (which includes the Telnet control) products. Both let you lot incorporate SSH and Telnet commands or final sessions into applications congenital with the .NET Framework, C#, Visual Bones .NET, ASP.Internet and WinForms. See the ComponentPro Spider web site for product details, documentation and license pricing.

Project Productivity
Templates and extensions that get your projects rolling quickly and efficiently are always welcome, and I've got a few new ones starting with Simplify.Web.Templates, a set up of templates for building Web applications with Simplify.Web, MVC and OWIN in Visual Studio 2017. A previous version of the Simplify.Web.Templates is as well available for Visual Studio 2015 and 2013.

Pollynator, by David Paul McQuiggin, is a lawmaking-generation tool for creating service-dependency interfaces. Specifically, Pollynator helps you generate code that employs the Polly: Polly library for resilience and transient fault handling in complicated applications that rely on other local or cloud-based services. I can see this being really useful.

Speaking of deject applications and services, Azure Functions and Web Jobs Tools provide essential tools for creating, debugging and publishing Azure Functions and Web Job projects if y'all're on a version prior to Visual Studio 2017 fifteen.3 (these tools take been rolled into subsequent releases of Visual Studio).

If you want to create your own project templates, accept a await at Sidewaffle Creator, by Sayed Ibrahim Hashimi. Information technology includes a template format and associated tools that allow you create custom project templates and integrate them into the New Project, Solution Explorer and context menu system within Visual Studio. This looks like one of those tools you'll need to sit down and really figure out, merely that endeavour will pay off every time you beginning a new custom project.

Lawmaking licenses aren't just for laughs. If you're using third-party code or libraries in your projects, it's important to know how your dependencies are licensed. Package Licenses (encounter Figure two) can aid yous with this by compiling a list of licenses for any NuGet packages in your solution. The extension infers the license from the projectUrl and licenseUrl properties in the package's metadata and downloads the relevant license text from GitHub and spdx.org.

**[Click on image for larger view.]** *Figure 2.* Package Licenses Compiles License Details for NuGet Packages in Your Solution

Coming at this same dependency metadata problem from a different angle, if you're editing files in a Git repository, Git Web Links lets y'all get a link dorsum to the file's repository on GitHub (or Bitbucket if that's how you roll). Git Web Link supports repositories hosted in GitHub, GitHub Enterprise, Bitbucket Server and Bitbucket Deject. Right-click back up is included for getting links from a file tab, Solution Explorer or a code option in the editor.

MultiMerge.2017 is another powerful tool for working with source control, allowing yous to search for comment text in Squad Foundation Server (TFS) changesets and then merge those changesets. It includes "in-between" changesets in the search results even if they don't include the search identifier, making certain yous merge the unabridged history.

More Handy Project Extensions
A footstep beyond project templates, Lawmaking Generation and T4 Text Templates provides design-time and runtime code generation for any Visual Studio project. Oleg V. Sych's T4 Toolbox for Visual Studio 2017 extends the code-generation functionality of T4 text templates to generate multiple output files from a single template, generate output to multiple projects or folders, and add or bank check out generated files from your source lawmaking command tools. T4 Toolbox besides adds syntax highlighting, outlining, tooltips, error reporting and statement completion for T4 text template editing in Visual Studio.

CoCo, by George Aleksandria, analyzes your lawmaking to provide a sort of quasi-semantic syntax highlighting for C# code in Visual Studio 2017. (See my August 2014 Visual Studio Mag article, "Semantic Code Highlighting," for more than details about lawmaking colorization.) CoCo's highlighting is entirely customizable and provides colorization for namespaces, local fields, parameters, methods, constructors, events, properties and more (come across Effigy 3). A version of CoCo for Visual Studio 2015 is available, as well.

**[Click on image for larger view.]** *Figure 3.* Coco Provides Boosted Code Highlighting Options

Fix Namespace, past Utkarsh Chauhan, does one simple and useful affair: Information technology searches all the C# files in the current projection and fixes the namespace based on the project default namespace and the file's folder relative to the project.

Some other handy tool for fixing namespaces in C# projects is NamespaceFixer. The method for invoking is slightly different, only as with the previously mentioned extension, it uses your project namespace and binder hierarchy to define the correct namespace for each C# file in a project.

Build-Time Extensions
If you utilise Chris Dahlberg'south StyleCop tools to enforce C# lawmaking style and consistency rules, check out the new StyleCop Check-in Policy 2017 extension. It works specifically with the StyleCop.MSBuild NuGet package, enabling y'all to configure your build settings so StyleCop warnings don't appear every bit errors during builds, but will keep team members from checking in bad code.

CheckoutAndBuild 2017, past Florian Gilde, helps Team Explorer users ready a local Continuous Integration (CI) surroundings. This enables y'all to make clean, checkout, build your solution, run tests and more than earlier checking in your code. The build process is highly configurable, allowing selective checkouts, custom build club, pre- and mail service-build scripts, complete visibility and control over awaiting changes, integrated error reporting, and more.

BuildOptimizer, past Alexander Satov, attempts to streamline and troubleshoot the build process. BuildOptimizer copies your project references, DLLs, and libraries, noting whatsoever mismatched versions, unused, or unreferenced projects and libraries. All of the mistake output shows you where the projection (and thus your build) can be decluttered and optimized.

Fast Koala, by Jon Davis, enables build-time configuration transforms for various projection types. You can run PowerShell and Node.js scripts with admission to MSBuild projection properties, as well as MSBuild scripts. The configuration changes tin be applied to a project locally and then built on any system with access to the needed build dependencies and scripts without Fast Koala installed on the build system, including TFS build servers. There are some caveats: Web sites and ASP.Net v (which includes ASP.Internet MVC six) aren't supported, and NuGet packages or other automated tasks that change spider web.config need to exist considered closely ... just the possibilities are pretty intriguing.

Put Some Fun in Your Editor
It'due south not all code-test-debug. You tin can accept some fun, too. Jefry Pozo'south VSToDoList (see Figure 4) gives you a uncomplicated, hierarchical checklist window right inside Visual Studio 2013, 2015 or 2017. It's corking for keeping track of your work tasks, but too for remembering to become groceries, have out the garbage, order more than pizza ... you know, the important things in life.

**[Click on image for larger view.]** *Figure four.* Vstodo Checklists in a Visual Studio Window -- Mark that Done!

PowerMode turns coding into a game, with particle effects, screen milkshake, philharmonic manner and streak score counters, and more. Inspired by the official Lawmaking in the Nighttime editor, go your developer Kung Fury on and code with authorization!

Finally, because his genius has been missed also long, say hi to ClippyVS, an extension for Visual Studio that resuscitates Clippy in (almost) all his celebrity (see Figure v). Information technology looks similar y'all're starting a Web Project. How can I assistance? Probably not by installing this extension, but hey, it's fun, and yeah, I similar Clippy and endorse this project.

**[Click on epitome for larger view.]** *Figure five.* Clippy Is Back in Visual Studio!

About the Author

Terrence Dorsey is a technical writer, editor and content strategist specializing in applied science and software development. Over the concluding 25-plus years he has worked on developer-focused projects at ESPN, The Code Project, and Microsoft. Read his weblog at http://terrencedorsey.com or follow @tpdorsey on Twitter.