Visual Studio Redesign: lose the designers, add a command prompt?

There has been a clear shift in the way I use Visual Studio lately. Visual studio has a lot of built-in panels to help you develop the next killer application. There are a lot of panels I hardly ever use. Most of my time I spend, not quite surprising, in the text editor editing code. As for the other panels I may be using about 10% of all available options. Windows like the Server Explorer, Document Outline, Object Browser, I don’t think I ever opened them while developing. And I didn’t even mention the designers yet. I am a full-time web developer but I never open the HTML designer.

So I would like to propose a Visual Studio redesign, let’s just throw out all the designers and unnecessary windows (like when editing a css file lose the CSS properties, Manage Styles, CSS Outline windows) and go back to basics. Build a really good text editor. Once everything is stripped to the bare minimum add a panel which gives you direct access to the command prompt. I got this idea from a Ruby on Rails editor called RadRails. You can generate controllers, models, etc… from a panel within the IDE.

Why a command prompt? I have noticed that developing isn’t centralized in Visual Studio any longer. Next to Visual Studio I always have a command prompt open. By using tools like JavaScriptMVC and LESS, I now use the command prompt very frequently. By running small commands from the command prompt snippets of code are generated for you. And although code generation is considered evil by some, there is a big difference between Microsoft code generation and those tools. They generate code for you but give you the opportunity to change it without any effort. The Microsoft way of code generation, the part I can remember because I try to use it as less as possible, is saying: do not touch our generated piece of art, you are not worthy. And if you dare to change it, it will smack you in the face for doing so. With code generated by Microsoft I constantly have the feeling that I’m not in control.

So my proposal is, stop building a huge beast with gazillion panels which tackles it all. Create a light weight text editor, let’s call it Textmate for Windows, and give users the possibility to add the tools they want to use in addition to that text editor by accessing them through the command prompt directly in the IDE.

I’ve googled around for a solution but the only posts that came near were posts which let you launch a command prompt from within Visual Studio. Not really what I was looking for. Let’s hope the Visual Studio Team has implemented this option in Visual Studio 2010…


Comments

July 27. 2009 02:26 PM

You can't just use the "Visual Studio Command Prompt" installed in your start menu? It needs to be placed within the IDE itself for what reason?

Ted Stevens

July 27. 2009 03:25 PM

@Ted
I am using the command prompt right now, but the point is that Visual Studio is currently bloated with all sorts of panels and designers that I never use. Something simple as a command prompt, which is more and more used by command line development tools isn't available. And when integrated in my IDE I don't go out of my IDE into a separate window to do development related stuff.

Peter

July 27. 2009 03:26 PM

Seriously? Peter only needs such an dsuch so lets build Visual Studio just for him. It is possible that other people do use these tools. Not everyone is a web developer and not everyone codes like you do. There are things youy do that I don't and things I us ethat you don't. Visual Studio was built for all of us and the enterprise in mind.

If its too much for you than download the Visual Web developer Express. http://www.microsoft.com/express/vwd/

Jonathan

July 27. 2009 04:17 PM

What an utterly lame suggestion. If you want a command line and a simple text editor use Vi. Problem solved.

Simon

July 27. 2009 06:01 PM

I totally agree, have even toyed with the idea of making such a tool myself.  Although at the end of the day this project is not that exciting, even though it would be extraordinarily useful.  Maybe one could build upon the foundation put forth by open source projects like MonoDevelop/SharpDevelop except drop out all the features trying to emulate VS bloat.

Nathan

July 27. 2009 06:02 PM

Excellent suggestion! If they don't want to drop the designers (because there is *probably* someone using them... somewhere), they could make a default "layout" that would have none of the designers showing except for the most used one.

As for the command prompt, I'm pretty sure we can build a simple UI that would replicate commands to the command prompt and incorporate it as a VS Addin. It is true that I rarely use those pesky designers. If I have to see HTML, I use the Markup View. The designer view is still too heavy for Visual Studio.

Hell, I'm not even talking about Source Control. The source control tool is freezing VS a lot of times because it's "doing something".

Css? Someone else knows EXACTLY how to write them. He doesn't need a designer tool for that. I think there is way too much focus on the designer and a way to hide them should be provided.

Good post!

Maxim

July 27. 2009 08:13 PM

I'm no fan of the designers either, but if you didn't have those, VS.net would just be a piss poor bloated notepad, and all the crap code the designers barf into your project would have to be coded by hand, which may lead to better and more maintainable code in the long run, but all those RAD aspects that no one seems to be able to do without would be gone.

Tom Willis

July 27. 2009 10:04 PM

What I've found handy is adding .bat files to my projects and then adding an external tool to execute the batch files.

The command should be $(ItemPath).
The arguments should be blank.
The initial directory should be $(ItemDir).
Check the "Use Output window" option.

I use this to execute command line stuff from within Visual Studio and the output is piped to the output window.

Charles Chen

July 27. 2009 10:05 PM

Just nonsense. It doesn't have to be an either or situation between CLI and GUI systems. Don't fall into the retarded ideology of the Linux camp. A command-line is for scripted use while a GUI is better for overall usability and exploration. They can both coexist peacefully. Please don't be an extremist.

terry

July 27. 2009 10:47 PM

Seems like there are a lot of opinions on this subject.

@Nathan
Although the idea of building this yourself is compelling, I really can't live without tools like Resharper. So we would also have to rebuild the good stuff from scratch. Won't be that easy I'm afraid.

@Maxim
A default layout would be a step in the right direction. But I would still like to see a 'command prompt panel'.

@Tom Willis
The point is not to build a bloated text editor, but a really good code editor with some really useful development tools on the side (Resharper being one of them). If you ask me, Visual Studio already is bloated...

@Charles Chen
Nice idea, this could be a bit of a workaround to accomplish something in the right direction. I'll definitely check that out!

@Terry
I try not to be an extremist, this is how I use Visual Studio and I've heard something similar from fellow developers. A lot of the panels/designers are never used.

Peter

July 28. 2009 07:48 AM

The only reason I like VS is because its the only way to use Resharper. No really, the day that I have an editor like IntelliJ for .NET languages, I'm gone.

Jan Van Ryswyck

January 28. 2010 05:00 PM

Trackback from Peter works on the web!

An alternative to editing JavaScript in Visual Studio: RubyMine

Peter works on the web!

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