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Help Content Manager overrides

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Applies to: yesVisual Studio noVisual Studio for Mac

Note

This article applies to Visual Studio 2017. If you're looking for the latest Visual Studio documentation, see Visual Studio documentation. We recommend upgrading to the latest version of Visual Studio. Download it here

You can change the default behavior of Help Viewer and help-related features in the Visual Studio IDE. Some options are specified by creating a .pkgdef file to set various registry key values. Others are set directly in the registry.

How to control Help Viewer behavior by using a .pkgdef file

  1. Create a .pkgdef file with the first line as [$RootKey$\Help].

  2. Add any or all of the registry key values described in the table below on separate lines, for example "UseOnlineHelp"=dword:00000001.

  3. Copy the file to %ProgramFiles(x86)%\Microsoft Visual Studio\2017\<edition>\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions.

  4. Run devenv /updateconfiguration in a developer command prompt.

Registry key values

Registry key value Type Data Description
NewContentAndUpdateService string <http URL for service endpoint> Define a unique service endpoint
UseOnlineHelp dword 0 to specify local Help, 1 to specify online Help Define online or offline Help default
OnlineBaseUrl string <http URL for service endpoint> Define a unique F1 endpoint
OnlineHelpPreferenceDisabled dword 0 to enable or 1 to disable online Help preference option Disable online Help preference option
DisableManageContent dword 0 to enable or 1 to disable the Manage Content tab in Help Viewer Disable the Manage Content tab
DisableFirstRunHelpSelection dword 0 to enable or 1 to disable help features that are configured the first time that Visual Studio starts Disable installation of content at first launch of Visual Studio

Example .pkgdef file contents

[$RootKey$\Help]
"NewContentAndUpdateService"="https://some.service.endpoint"
"UseOnlineHelp"=dword:00000001
"OnlineBaseUrl"="https://some.service.endpoint"
"OnlineHelpPreferenceDisabled"=dword:00000000
"DisableManageContent"=dword:00000000
"DisableFirstRunHelpSelection"=dword:00000001

Use Registry Editor to change Help Viewer behavior

The following two behaviors can be controlled by setting registry key values in the Registry Editor.

Task Registry Key Value Data
Override BITS job priority HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node (on a 64-bit machine)\Microsoft\Help\v2.3 BITSPriority foreground, high, normal, or low
Point to local content store on network share HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Help\ v2.3\Catalogs\VisualStudio15 LocationPath "ContentStoreNetworkShare"

See also