Visual Studio Commands
Visual Studio commands allow you to invoke a command from the Command window, Immediate window, or Find/Command box. In each case, the greater than sign (>) is used to indicate that a command rather than a search or debug operation is to follow.
You can find a complete list of commands and their syntax in the Keyboard, Environment Options dialog box.
The escape character for Visual Studio commands is a caret (^) character, which means that the character immediately following it is interpreted literally, rather than as a control character. This can be used to embed straight quotation marks ("), spaces, leading slashes, carets, or any other literal characters in a parameter or switch value, with the exception of switch names. For example,
>Edit.Find ^^t /regex
A caret functions the same whether it is inside or outside quotation marks. If a caret is the last character on the line, it is ignored.
In localized versions of the IDE, command names can be entered either in the native language of the IDE or in English. For example, you can type either File.NewFile or Fichier.NouveauFichier in the French IDE to execute the same command.
Many commands have aliases. For a list of command aliases, see Visual Studio Command Aliases.
The following commands take arguments and/or switches.
Command Name |
Description |
|---|---|
Adds an existing file to the current solution and opens it. |
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Adds an existing project to the current solution. |
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Adds a new solution item, such as an .htm, .css, .txt, or frameset to the current solution and opens it. |
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Creates a new alias for a complete command, complete command and arguments, or even another alias. |
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Evaluates and displays the given statement. |
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Searches files using a subset of the options available on the Find and Replace control. |
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Searches files using a subset of the options available on the Find in Files. |
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Moves the cursor to the specified line. |
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Displays the current call stack. |
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Begins the debug process and allows you to specify how errors are handled. |
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Displays the contents of the specified range of memory. |
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Lists the modules for the current process. |
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Displays a list of registers. |
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Displays the specified lines of source code. |
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Displays a list of the threads in the current program. |
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Copies all input and output from the Command window into a file. |
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Creates a new file and adds it to the currently selected project. |
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Opens an existing file and allows you to specify an editor. |
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Opens an existing project and allows you to add the project to the current solution. |
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Opens an existing solution. |
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Evaluates the expression and displays the results or the specified text. |
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Displays the selected or specified text in the Expression field of the Quick Watch dialog box. |
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Replaces text in files using a subset of the options available on the Find and Replace control. |
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Replaces text in files using a subset of the options available in the Replace in Files. |
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Allows you to view a particular stack frame. |
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Allows you to view a particular thread. |
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Determines the number of bytes to view. |
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Launches programs from within Visual Studio as though the command has been executed from the command prompt. |
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Displays the URL you specify in a Web browser window either within the integrated development environment (IDE) or external to the IDE. |
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Begins the debug process and allows you to specify how errors are handled. |
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Sets the list of directories for the debugger to search for symbols. |
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Turns the breakpoint either on or off, depending on its current state, at the current location in the file. |
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Creates and opens a specified instance of a Watch window. |