Properties Window and Property Pages

The Visual Studio Properties window is a universal property browser for COM and COM+ components and supports all Visual Studio products. The Properties window works with ITypeInfo type information and COM+ metadata to list the design-time properties for the currently selected object in any other window in the integrated development environment (IDE).

The Properties window, which can be opened by pressing F4 on the keyboard, or selecting Properties Window on the View menu, is used to view and edit configuration-independent, design-time properties and events of selected objects. Configuration-dependent properties, associated with solutions and projects, are displayed on Property Pages. For more information, see Project Properties, Managing Configuration Options, and Item Management in Projects.

Properties window

This section provides detailed information that relates to the individual areas of the Properties window and the interfaces that you must implement and call to populate the window.

In This Section

• Properties Window Overview
  Explains the purpose of the Properties window relative to the tool window and the document window.

• Template Policy and the Properties Window
  Discusses how a project is contained in an enterprise template project, and how that enterprise template project can enforce policy.

• Properties Window Fields and Interfaces
  Explains the basis for selection that determines what information is displayed in the Properties window.

• Properties Window Object List
  Describes the purpose of the Properties window object list, describing how, when a different object from this list triggers a call, the environment is informed that a new object has been selected.

• Properties Window Buttons
  Explains the purpose of the four default buttons displayed on the Properties window toolbar.

• Properties Display Grid
  Explains where the property names and property values fields are found in the grid.

• How to: Announce Selection Tracking to the Environment
  Describes selection tracking for the Properties window.

• How to: Hide Properties That Have Child Properties
  Explains how to hide properties that have child properties by implementing the IVsPerPropertyBrowsing interface.

• How to: Provide a Custom Properties Window
  Details the steps for providing your own property browser.

• How to: Retrieve Properties Window Field Descriptions
  Explains where to find the description area that displays information related to the selected property field.

• How to: Update Property Values in the Properties Window
  Provides step-by-step instructions that show the two ways to keep the Properties window synchronized with property value changes.

Related Sections

• Project Types
  Discusses projects as the building blocks of the Visual Studio IDE.

• Building in Visual Studio
  Describes how you can use the Visual Studio Platform for continuously testing and debugging applications as you build them.

• HTML Document Properties, Properties Window
  Provides instructions for editing an HTML document directly from the Properties window, and provides a table detailing the fields in an HTML document in the Properties window.

• IDispatch Interface [Automation]
  Describes the IDispatch interface, which was first designed to support automation, providing a late-bound mechanism to access and retrieve information about the methods and properties of an object.

• Introduction to Dynamic Properties (Visual Studio)
  Provides an overview of dynamic properties that let you configure your application so that property values are stored in an external configuration file instead of the application's compiled code.

• Projects as Containers
  Describes the role of the project as a container in a solution to logically manage, build, and debug the items that make up your application.

• Project Properties
  Describes how the project manages settings that let you control properties that apply to the whole project and also properties that are limited to certain build configurations of the project.

• Introduction to Solutions, Projects, and Items
  Explains how Visual Studio efficiently manages the items such as references, data connections, folders, and files that are required by your development effort through solutions and projects.

• User Interfaces
  Explains how to use Visual Studio services to create UI elements that match the rest of Visual Studio.