Extend projects

Applies to: Visual Studio Visual 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

Projects and solutions are the ways Visual Studio organizes code and resource files into compilation and deployment units. You can find more information about projects in Projects (Visual Studio SDK).

You can create your own project types with the Visual Studio SDK and the Managed Package Framework for Projects, which you can download at Managed Package Framework for Projects. To understand how custom projects are implemented, see New project generation: Under the hood, part one and New project generation: Under the hood, part two.

The topics in this section describe how to create custom projects and how to manage different types of Visual Studio solution.

In this section

• Create a basic project system, part 1 Describes how to create a custom project system.

• Create a basic project system, part 2 Describes how to create a custom project system.

• Save data in project files Explains how add to project (.proj*) files.

• Verify subtypes of a project at run time Explains how to verify the subtype of a project at run time.

• Add and remove property pages Explains how to customize the property pages for your custom project.

• Add an attribute to a project item Explains how to add an attribute to a custom project item.

• Persist the property of a project item Explains how to persist the properties of a custom project item.

• Manage universal Windows projects Explains how to manage universal projects.