Visual Studio .NET 2003 Tip o' the day

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Ok, I'm pulling another little tip out of my big grab bag of useful programmer tricks. These one is quite simple to do and I use it all the time. How many times do you have to go to your local file system to look at your solution's files? For me, it's all the time. Sure you could create a shortcut on your quicklaunch bar to your Visual Studio Projects folder but what if your SCCP places your source somewhere else? Here's what I do:

1. Open up Visual Studio .NET
2. From the main menu, click on Tools -> External Tools
3. Click the Add button
4. Enter the following values in the following fields

  • Title: Explore Here
  • Command: explorer.exe
  • *Arguments: $(SolutionDir)
  • *Initial Directory: $(SolutionDir)

* You can also use $(ProjectDir) but you'll have to highlight the project in Solution Explorer first.
5. Click on OK to close the External Tools dialog.

Now whenever you are working on a project, just click on Tools -> Explore Here and you'll get just what you asked for. Even better, make it a button on your toolbar for even easier access.