Changing the font size in VS.NET

One of the repetitive tasks I always find myself doing for presentations and demos is adjusting the font size in VS.NET. I'll open the IDE, someone at the back of the room will announce that they can't read the font and then I'll spend a valuable 10 minutes hunting through the myriad of options for a suitable font size.

In a recent post on presentation tips, Scott Hanselman addresses this very issue. By launching devenv.exe with the /fs switch you can set all of the majority of the fonts in the IDE with one command line.  For example, devenv.exe /fs 18 - will set the fonts in the IDE to 18pt. This will remain the case until you revert it back with devenv.exe /fs 8. 

A great tip, I think you'll agree. You can read more of Scott's tips in his article.

Comments

• Anonymous
  February 24, 2004
  Just be prepared to not find the OK button sometimes :)
  
  I run at 800 x 600 w/ 14pt Luicda Console, and start with a /fs 14. Seems to be a nice balance of big ol' fonts and being able to actually use things like the Options dialog.
  
  And like Scott has said in the past about himself, I actually program in 14pt Lucida Console now at home.
• Anonymous
  February 24, 2004
  I just tried this and it didn't increase the size of the font in the code editor. All the menus and window text was bigger, but not the actual code. For demos that is really the most important font size to increase!
• Anonymous
  February 24, 2004
  Right, the /fs switch changes all the other things that aren't easily changed from Tools/Options. Changing the default font is pretty easy through Tools/Options/Environment. Changing all the other IDE fonts is a little trickier (and is what this switch does well).
  
  Scott also has another good suggestion of creating a user called "Big Fonty" and using him for presentations ;-)