I want to add a new option in Visual Studio 2010's solution explorer's context menu for a specific file type. So for example, right clicking on a *.cs file will show the existing context menu plus "my new option".
I'm wondering what the code would look like; and would love a pointer to a good reference for developing visual studio plug-ins. The tutorials/references I'm seeing are conspicuously horrid.
Thanks!
It took me about 5 hours to do this.
There are 2 options, Visual studio Add-in (or shared Add-in) vs Visual studio package.
The package is far more complicated to give you far more control, but for a context menu on the solution explorer it is not needed.
So new project-> Other Project Types -> Extensibility -> Visual Studio Add-in.
Here's a walk-through - Link
Also This one I followed some - Link
I recommend you leave on the option for add to tools menu until you have the context menu working, or to provide a place to put a settings dialog (if you don't write a Tool-> options page.
Here's the connection code:
_applicationObject = (DTE2)application;
_addInInstance = (AddIn)addInInst;
if (connectMode == ext_ConnectMode.ext_cm_UISetup)
{
object[] contextGUIDS = new object[] { };
Commands2 commands = (Commands2)_applicationObject.Commands;
string toolsMenuName = "Tools";
//Place the command on the tools menu.
//Find the MenuBar command bar, which is the top-level command bar holding all the main menu items:
Microsoft.VisualStudio.CommandBars.CommandBar menuBarCommandBar = ((Microsoft.VisualStudio.CommandBars.CommandBars)_applicationObject.CommandBars)["MenuBar"];
//Find the Tools command bar on the MenuBar command bar:
CommandBarControl toolsControl = menuBarCommandBar.Controls[toolsMenuName];
CommandBarPopup toolsPopup = (CommandBarPopup)toolsControl;
// get popUp command bars where commands will be registered.
CommandBars cmdBars = (CommandBars)(_applicationObject.CommandBars);
CommandBar vsBarItem = cmdBars["Item"]; //the pop up for clicking a project Item
CommandBar vsBarWebItem = cmdBars["Web Item"];
CommandBar vsBarMultiItem = cmdBars["Cross Project Multi Item"];
CommandBar vsBarFolder = cmdBars["Folder"];
CommandBar vsBarWebFolder = cmdBars["Web Folder"];
CommandBar vsBarProject = cmdBars["Project"]; //the popUpMenu for right clicking a project
CommandBar vsBarProjectNode = cmdBars["Project Node"];
//This try/catch block can be duplicated if you wish to add multiple commands to be handled by your Add-in,
// just make sure you also update the QueryStatus/Exec method to include the new command names.
try
{
//Add a command to the Commands collection:
Command command = commands.AddNamedCommand2(_addInInstance, "HintPaths", "HintPaths", "Executes the command for HintPaths", true, 59, ref contextGUIDS, (int)vsCommandStatus.vsCommandStatusSupported + (int)vsCommandStatus.vsCommandStatusEnabled, (int)vsCommandStyle.vsCommandStylePictAndText, vsCommandControlType.vsCommandControlTypeButton);
//Add a control for the command to the tools menu:
if ((command != null) && (toolsPopup != null))
{
//command.AddControl(toolsPopup.CommandBar, 1);
command.AddControl(vsBarProject);
}
}
catch (System.ArgumentException argEx)
{
System.Diagnostics.Debug.Write("Exception in HintPaths:" + argEx.ToString());
//If we are here, then the exception is probably because a command with that name
// already exists. If so there is no need to recreate the command and we can
// safely ignore the exception.
}
}
}
This code checks to see if what the user has selected is a project for instance:
private Project GetProject()
{
if (_applicationObject.Solution == null || _applicationObject.Solution.Projects == null || _applicationObject.Solution.Projects.Count < 1)
return null;
if (_applicationObject.SelectedItems.Count == 1 && _applicationObject.SelectedItems.Item(1).Project != null)
return _applicationObject.SelectedItems.Item(1).Project;
return null;
}
Note that certain string names in your code have to match up and I'm not sure which ones they are quite yet as I just did this yesterday.
I found that the best way to go was to make a Visual Studio Package instead of an Visual Studio Add-in. The vsix deployment experience is so slick - the whole thing was a really easy experience. It only supports Visual Studio 2010, but that was good enough in my case.
Here is the resulting vsct:
<Commands package="guidBingfooPluginPkg">
<Groups>
<Group guid="guidBingfooPluginCmdSet" id="MyMenuGroup" priority="0x0600">
<Parent guid="guidSHLMainMenu" id="IDM_VS_CTXT_ITEMNODE"/>
</Group>
</Groups>
<Buttons>
<Button guid="guidBingfooPluginCmdSet" id="cmdidfooLocalBox" priority="0x0100" type="Button">
<Parent guid="guidBingfooPluginCmdSet" id="MyMenuGroup" />
<!-- <Icon guid="guidImages" id="bmpPic1" /> -->
<CommandFlag>DynamicVisibility</CommandFlag>
<Strings>
<CommandName>cmdidfooLocalBox</CommandName>
<ButtonText>View in foo</ButtonText>
</Strings>
</Button>
<Button guid="guidBingfooPluginCmdSet" id="cmdidfooTestBed" priority="0x0100" type="Button">
<Parent guid="guidBingfooPluginCmdSet" id="MyMenuGroup" />
<CommandFlag>DynamicVisibility</CommandFlag>
<Strings>
<CommandName>cmdidfooTestBed</CommandName>
<ButtonText>View in foo on Test Beds</ButtonText>
</Strings>
</Button>
</Buttons>
<Bitmaps>
<Bitmap guid="guidImages" href="Resources\Images_32bit.bmp" usedList="bmpPic1, bmpPic2, bmpPicSearch, bmpPicX, bmpPicArrows"/>
</Bitmaps>
</Commands>
<Symbols>
<GuidSymbol name="guidBingfooPluginPkg" value="{62c4a13c-cc61-44a0-9e47-33111bd323ce}" />
<GuidSymbol name="guidBingfooPluginCmdSet" value="{59166210-d88c-4259-9809-418bc332b0ab}">
<IDSymbol name="MyMenuGroup" value="0x1020" />
<IDSymbol name="cmdidfooLocalBox" value="0x0100" />
<IDSymbol name="cmdidfooTestBed" value="0x0101" />
</GuidSymbol>
<GuidSymbol name="guidImages" value="{2dff8307-a49a-4951-a236-82e047385960}" >
<IDSymbol name="bmpPic1" value="1" />
<IDSymbol name="bmpPic2" value="2" />
<IDSymbol name="bmpPicSearch" value="3" />
<IDSymbol name="bmpPicX" value="4" />
<IDSymbol name="bmpPicArrows" value="5" />
</GuidSymbol>
</Symbols>
</CommandTable>
UPDATE:
GAX/GAT for VS2010 also available from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff687173
ORIGINAL POST
Well is horrid because VS is really complex. Using GAX/GAT was possible, but there's no VS2010 Version yet.
What I suggest is downloading some samples from the Visual Studio Gallery to try to understand how the whole thing works, sadly not an easy task.
HTH
I found myself having to add an item to the code editor window context menu, which ended up being cmdBars["Script Context"]
as I was wanting it specifically for JavaScript files.
As a technique for finding this which I felt useful sharing, I added the new menu item to all (456) menu controls in visual studio with the following loop:
foreach (CommandBar cc in cmdBars)
{
if (cc.Index >= 1 && cc.Index <= 456)
{
command.AddControl(cmdBars[cc.NameLocal]);
}
}
I then narrowed this using a divide and conquer technique by adjusting the bounds of the loop:
if (cc.Index >= 1 && cc.Index <= 256)
...
if (cc.Index >= 1 && cc.Index <= 128)
...
if (cc.Index >= 64 && cc.Index <= 128)
...etc...
Until I eventually found what I was looking for.
(The related question for this is at Visual Studio 2010 Plug-in - Adding a context-menu to the Editor Window)