Navigation As You Type in Object Explorer Details Pane

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In my previous blog entry I talked about how Search works within the Object Explorer Details window in SQL Server 2008 Management Studio. What people often forget is that the Object Explorer Details window has a navigate as you type capability. Assuming that you have the Object Explorer Details window open and the Name column is sorted, just type in the name of the object you are looking for and type in.

Here is a little experiment that I tried using three ways of filtering/navigation so that I could access the full context menu for the PurchaseOrderDetail table in the SQL Server 2005 Adventureworks OLTP database sample.

Start from OE with AdventureWorks collapsed. No OED window open using the Filter Dialog, Search in OED, and then Navigate As You Type in OED.

Filter Dialog

1.Press T to select table folder

2.Click Filter icon

3.Click in Value cell for Name Contains

4.Type Purch

5.Click OK

6.Expand Tables node

7.Right click on PurchaseOrderDetail table

Search in OED

1.Press T to select table folder

2.Press F7 to display OED

3.Click in Search box

4.Type Purch%

5.Right click on PurchaseOrderDetail table

6.Choose Sync command (you have to do this because the full command list is not available from search)

7.Scan OED for expanded PurchaseOrderDetail table

8.Right click on PurchaseOrderDetail table that is selected

Navigate As You Type OED

1.Press T to select table folder

2.Press F7 to display OED

3.Click on Name column if not already sorted (Name is sorted by default – just wanted to be sure)

4.Type Purch

5.Right click on PurchaseOrderDetail table that is selected

As you can see, Navigate As You Type in the Object Explorer Details window can get you there fastest without any context shifts like the Filter dialog or Search and sync.

Navigate As You Type also works in the Object Explorer tree, but you need to type in the schema name first which can be a problem if you aren’t sure of the schema the table is in.

Be sure to check out Navigate As You Type the next time you are in SSMS.

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