Tabs Studio Blog (organizing Visual Studio document tabs)

May 9, 2010

Troubleshooter add-in

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: — Sergey Vlasov @ 10:34 pm

Troubleshooter doesn’t extend Tabs Studio with new features, it just logs as much as possible about Visual Studio execution.

The following information is logged: OS version, VS version, loaded dlls (updated every 10 seconds), VS command/document/solution/window events, Tabs Studio events, WPF warnings. I try to collect as little personal data as possible. For example, instead of file names only extensions are logged and instead of project names only project types are logged.

Each Visual Studio session is logged in a separate file. Log file names look like “Troubleshooter January 24, 21_20_01 Part 0.txt” where “January 24, 21_20_01” is the time of Visual Studio start. If log file size exceeds 50 MB, a file for the next log part is created. Log files are created in the “LocalApplicationData\Sergey Vlasov\Tabs Studio” folder.

Troubleshooter installer installs the add-in for VS 2008 and creates a desktop shortcut to the logs folder.

Troubleshooter v1.0.1 and source code (including WiX based installer) are available. I think Visual Studio events subscription is the most interesting part of the source code for those interested in extending Visual Studio functionality.

May 8, 2010

Styling tabs in a separate window

Filed under: Uncategorized — Tags: , — Sergey Vlasov @ 7:43 pm

In Visual Studio 2010 default style for tabs uses left and right margins of 1 pixel:

<Style x:Key="DefaultTabsStyle" TargetType="TabsStudio:Tabs">
  <Setter Property="Margin" Value="1,0,1,0"/>
</Style>

It makes transition between Tabs Studio tabs and Visual Studio border under the tabs in the left and right corners smooth:

Left tab margin

Left tab margin


When tabs are in a separate window, default margins create white lines to the left and to the right of the tabs:
White lines to the left and to the right of the tabs

White lines to the left and to the right of the tabs


Setting margins to 0 removes these lines:

<Style TargetType="TabsStudio:Tabs" BasedOn="{StaticResource DefaultTabsStyle}">
  <Setter Property="Margin" Value="0,0,0,0"/>
</Style>

Excessive tabs margins removed

Excessive tabs margins removed

Another useful customization for tabs in a separate window is tabs background. The default background in VS 2010 style is transparent, it results in dark blue for normal tabs placement and white for tabs in a separate window. As an example, the following style sets tabs background to dark blue:

<Style TargetType="TabsStudio:Tabs" BasedOn="{StaticResource DefaultTabsStyle}">
  <Setter Property="Background" Value="#293955"/>
</Style>

Dark blue tabs background

Dark blue tabs background


A similar style can be used to customize tabs background in VS 2008, which is by default grey control brush.

May 7, 2010

Tabs Studio v2.0.1 released

Filed under: Releases — Tags: — Sergey Vlasov @ 8:55 pm

Tabs Studio v2.0.1 released – fixed tabs reordering when entering the debug mode in Visual Studio 2010.

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