'Smart Tabs' concept allows to automatically insert tab character for block indentation and space characters for in-block formatting. It's described here. Unfortunately, Visual Studio's 'smart tabs' option in text editor settings just indents text on enter press. Same name, completely different and near useless thing :). So, maybe someone knows of a visual studio addin that can change how 'tab' key work so it will insert tab characters and space characters according to rules mentioned above? Any hints are welcome.
Update: I need it for C++. According to comments, ReSharper can do something like this, but only for Basic and C#.
I have mapped the tab-button to Edit.FormatSelection in Visual Studio to achieve this and it works very well for me. I have also remapped the normal functionality of tab so that I still can access them (Edit.InsertTab and Edit.TabLeft).
If no one comes up with an "as-you-type" utility, then Astyle with its convert-tabs and indent=tab options will reformat code after-the-fact.
ReSharper does this pretty well, and is highly configurable.
Have you looked at Visual Assist?
It's been a while since I used it (back on VC++ 6.0!), and I can't see a mention of "Smart Tabs" on the home page, but it might be there somewhere.
Related
I recently started using C in Visual Studio, and I've been having an issue where Visual Studio automatically lists the name of parameters in front of arguments to functions. It's possible I unintentionally pressed a key.
Example:
As you can see in the image, the _Format: is being displayed, which is quite annoying. I have browsed through the text editor settings, but I can't seem to find the issue.
I mainly use VS for C#, and so far this only seems to happen with C. Any solution would be appreciated.
First step, go to options. Press Ctrl+Q then type "inline":
Second step, uncheck inline hints:
I use C#, but I think the settings are the same here.
As one answer already stated, this option exists for C#.
But if that doesn't work for C, check the following link:
similar problem
Quote from the linked answer:
"If you're using C/C++ the inline hints works a bit differently. Here alt-F1 or Ctrl-Ctrl can TOGGLE hints."
I have recently been exploring C++ some after using C# exclusively for quite awhile. I'm using Visual Studio 2013 and the one thing that is bugging me to death is the inability to commit an Intellisense suggestion by pressing the space bar. I have tried to edit the commit character list in Options -> Text Editor -> C/C++ -> Advanced to accept the space bar but so far I've had no luck. Coming from C# this is very aggravating. Does anybody know if it's possible to make such a change? I know I can use Tab or Enter, but in my opinion using Space is far more fluid.
Any information would be greatly appreciated.
UPDATE: Space seems to commit some suggestions but not others. if I type "std::stri", it commits "std::string". Unfortunately, Intellisense won't commit anything created by me or even common keywords. It just adds a space after what I already typed.
Further to my comment on your question, I have installed the trial version of Visual Studio 2013 (Ultimate), and can confirm that space bar does work to complete IntelliSense suggestions. Combining all comments, it would appear that it works in the following versions:
VS 2010
VS 2012
VS 2013
Here is a screenshot of my IntelliSense settings located at Tools > Options > Text Editor > C/C++ > Advanced:
As a last resort you may want to try changing all your settings back to default, as suggested in this answer:
Tools > Import and Export Settings > Reset all settings
UPDATE: After reading JoshC's comments, I have experimented a bit more and I get the problem too. It appears to be related to whether or not the item you are trying to autocomplete is a member of a type or namespace. If it is (e.g. std::string) then space will work. If it is not (e.g. void) then it will not work (but for some reason, tab will work). As per this link, you can manually invoke the "List Members feature" by pressing CTRL+J in which case on a blank line it will include items which are in the global namespace - however this is clearly not a practical solution.
I have no idea why it discriminates between space and tab in this way. If anyone is aware of a workaround please let me know and I will edit this answer again.
The following would seem to imply that there is no solution for C++:
http://visualstudio.uservoice.com/forums/121579-visual-studio/suggestions/2656132-support-committed-by-pressing-the-space-bar-in-c
When using Visual Studios 2012 for coding in C++, how do you autocomplete code selected in IntelliSense? (see comments)
I'm using VS2012 and I'm quite happy with it. But the problem is, whem I'm coding in C++, that the syntax highlighting is turning off an on all over again. Sometimes, the highlighting is off and I have to reload the file. Also, it highlighting is quite slow.
Does anyone know how to fix it?
I know this is a while ago but I have had this same problem appearing randomly until just now.
It would disable when the last line in a file was a single line comment. (// blah blah). As soon as i removed that the text highlighting worked again!
Edit: In this answer I assume that your problem description is correct. In other words, I'm assuming that occasionally C++ highlighting is working, and the other times the text appears as plain text: completely black and white.
My guess is you are using an extension which modifies or replaces the way Visual Studio highlights C++ code. Try temporarily disabling all of your extensions and checking again if the editor is working. Some extensions might have the Disable button disabled; in that case you'll need to uninstall the extension for this test (possibly through Control Panel → Programs and Features).
As an example of one common extension that completely replaces the C++ highlighter is Visual Assist. However, I do not personally use that product and I haven't heard of any specific problems with it of this nature. I am merely mentioning it as an example of an extension that completely changes the behavior of Visual Studio in regards to syntax highlighting of C++ code.
For me, highlighting always stops working when the first visible line in the editor begins with the characters '//' and I trigger reparsing somehow (CTRL + S for instance).
Highlighting always works fine when the first visible line in the editor begins with anything else, even with a whitespace, and I trigger reparsing somehow.
I could indent all my comments and never experience this problem, but now that I know about it, it's not so annoying anymore, so I let it be.
This is a bug in Visual Studio 2012:
https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/760154/syntax-highlighting-sometimes-not-working
If you're using only Intellisense, you may go to Edit->Intellisense->Toggle Completion Mode (or hit Ctrl + Alt + Space), play with it and see if it works (maybe you've pressed this combination of keys by accident).
I've also installed Update 3 and haven't had any problems since. Who knows..
I had the same problem. Disabling the extentions sadly did not work for me.
After searching around and realizing that it only happened on larger files,
I got it to work by turning harware acceleration off.
Tools->Options...->Environment->General
*Automatically adjust [...] (off)
*Use hardware graphics acceleration (off)
In my case, it turned out that a large block of code (a 200+ line method) was commented out with // starting in the first column, and this was causing the syntax coloring not to work. I changed the commenting delineation to /* ... */ for that method and all of the syntax coloring was fixed.
Personally, I found that things like:
#if 0// bla-bla
mess up syntax highlighting badly. The solution that works for is to put a space before a comment, like so:
#if 0 // bla-bla
I installed Visual Studio 2012 Update 3 yesterday and started experiencing the exact same behavior described in the original post. Based on some suggestions in this thread, I took at look at my extensions, and disabling AllMargins fixed the issue. I've since re-enabled AllMargins and everything appears to be working as it should.
Try disabling and re-enabling any of your extensions; hopefully that will fix the issue for you.
Please guide me, how do you enable autocomplete functionality in VS C++? By auto-complete, I mean, when I put a dot after control name, the editor should display a dropdown menu to select from.
Thank you.
Start writing, then just press CTRL+SPACE and there you go ...
When you press ctrl + space, look in the Status bar below.. It will display a message saying IntelliSense is unavailable for C++ / CLI, if it doesn't support it.. The message will look like this -
It's enabled by default. Probably you just tried on an expression that failed to autocomplete.
In case you deactivated it somehow... you can enable it in the Visual Studio settings. Just browse to the Editor settings, then to the subgroup C/C++ and activate it again... should read something like "List members automatically" or "Auto list members" (sorry, I have the german Visual Studio).
Upon typing something like std::cout. a dropwdownlist with possible completitions should pop up.
All the answers were missing Ctrl-J (which enables and disables autocomplete).
Goto => Tools >> Options >> Text Editor >> C/C++ >> Advanced >>
IntelliSense
Change => Member List Commit Aggressive to True
VS is kinda funny about C++ and IntelliSense. There are times it won't notice that it's supposed to be popping up something. This is due in no small part to the complexity of the language, and all the compiling (or at least parsing) that'd need to go on in order to make it better.
If it doesn't work for you at all, and it used to, and you've checked the VS options, maybe this can help.
Have you tried Visual Assist X ? Sort of lights up the VS editor.
I came across over the following post:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/raulperez/archive/2010/03/19/c-intellisense-options.aspx
The issue is that the "IntelliSense" option in c++ is disabled.
This link explains about the IntelliSense database configuration and options.
After enabling the database you must close and reopen visual studio
for autocomplete use 'ctrl'+'space'
'ctrl'+'space' will open C/C++ autocomplete.
Include the class that you are using Within your text file, then intelliSense will know where to look when you type within your text file. This works for me.
So it’s important to check the Unreal API to see where the included class is so that you have the path to type on the include line. Hope that makes sense.
It's enabled by default. Probably you just tried on an expression that failed to autocomplete.
In case you deactivated it somehow... you can enable it in the Visual Studio settings.
Step 1: Go to settings
Step 2: Search for complete and enable all the auto complete functions
I believe that show help
MS Visual Studio editor highlights some non-keyword identifiers as keywords
in C++ files. Particularly "event" and "array" are treated as keywords.
That's very annoying to me, because they are not C++ keywords.
I know how to add my own keywords to the list of syntax-highlighted identifiers,
but how to remove existing built-in ones?
I'm aware that this may require patching some executable files.
So does anyone know how to do this?
Thanks to article mentioned by Steve Guidi, I was able to find executable file that contains Colorizer and IScanner classes. It is named vcpkg.dll and located in /Microsoft Visual Studio 8/VC/vcpackages. (I'm using Visual C++ 2005 Express Edition, things may be different in other versions.)
The vcpkg.dll contains null-terminated UTF-16 encoded strings. I've opened it with hex editor, and searched for "array". There is only one such string in the file, so I've replaced it with "arrry". (It is important to maintain relative alphabetical order with respect to other keywords.) Then I've searched for "event", it shows up in several places, but there is only one that isn't part of some longer string, so I've replaced this one with "evvvt". After starting Visual Studio, it turned out that "array" and "event" weren't any longer highlighted, but "arrry" and "evvvt" were!
Of course this is an ugly hack, and it will void your warranty,
and probably goes against Microsoft EULA, but what a relief for the eyes!
Anyway, if you want to do it, be careful and remember to backup the file.
It doesn't look like a disable-syntax-coloring feature is exposed in a user-friendly way.
The only way I can think of selectively disabling syntax coloring is to create a new syntax coloring plugin for the IDE, and list all of the keywords you want colored. Microsoft gives information in this article on how to accomplish this task.
The drawback to this approach is that your IDE will now have two C++ languages and I'm not sure how it will select which plug-in to choose from once it loads a .h or .cpp file. However, this article suggests that you can override the existing C++ plug-ins by rewriting some registry keys.
I think the only "semi-practical" way to accomplish this to create a Visual Studio package that uses Text Markers to selectively cover up the keywords you don't want colored. Even that is not a little one-day task. Edit: Probably not even a full week task for someone not intricately familiar with the Visual Studio API and all its quirks, especially not getting it bug-free.
In other words, you probably want to just ignore them.