Visual Studio Hacks

Take Control of Your Workspace #16

Chapter 3, Navigating Visual Studio

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HACK

The new interface makes it easier to determine where you are docking some-

thing. You can simply move your cursor over one of the blue icons and the

window will dock there. Dropping it in the center circle will cause it to

become a tabbed document along with the source code files.

Windows can be set to dockable but still be floating windows; dockable just

means that you can dock them if you want to. Holding Ctrl while dragging

the window will prevent it from docking so you can place it over a dock

location without it docking to that location.

Floating. If a window is set to floating, it cannot be docked. It will float right

above the IDE and will always be on top of any docked windows below it.

Hidden. Hiding a window simply means that it is not shown on your screen

anywhere. It is the same as closing the window. If you hide a window, you

can always show it again by going to View and then selecting the window in

that list or under the Other Windows menu option.

Auto hide. Auto hide is a very cool feature that is best used through the little

pin icon that appears on the menu at the top of each window. Click the pin

when the window is docked to hide it; it will be replaced by a small vertical

menu on the side of the screen. You can then click or hover over the icon on

the vertical menu to make the window slide back into