Going lean in Visual Studio (even more than Jimmy!)

12 July 2008

Jimmy Bogard appropriately points out that Visual Studio gets really cluttered with toolbars that rarely get used.   It's more productive to keep your hands on the keyboard, so that leaves little mousing.  Even moving around the solution explorer doesn't really require the mouse.  So these toolbars just take up space.

There is an option in Tools > Options where you can nuke the navigation drop-downs at the top of the window.  After all, how often do you use them.  If your classes are small the answer is probably never.  If you use Resharper (CTRL+F12) the answer is probably never

 

The bottom checkbox is "Navigation bar".  Unchecking this option will make the pesky drop-downs at the top go away.  The below screenshot is how I roll.

To answer Javier's question (comment below), yes, I also turn off animation.  When you need to work quickly, animation is annoying.  I just want things to happen as quickly as possible.  Visual Studio, Windows, anything.  Animation distracts.

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Visual Studio Links #51 Posted on 7.14.2008 at 7:19 AM

My latest in a series of the weekly, or more often, summary of interesting links I come across related to Visual Studio. Visual Studio 2008 KB: Also applied to 2005. The Visual Studio Designer does not Respect Assembly Binding Redirection. No current

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Javier Lozano said on 7.12.2008 at 11:12 PM

Do you also have Animation turned off for windows? That makes things way faster.

Now, you only need to use a "dark" theme and you're all set! :)

Ilya Ryzhenkov said on 7.13.2008 at 4:00 AM

Removing all those bars also improves performance. VS query status of each button on toolbar (to enable/disable/change image/hide/show) and NavBar is eating too much resources as well.

Tobin Harris said on 7.14.2008 at 4:48 AM

Nice hint, thanks!

I've just disabled the drop downs and the tool bars - much cleaner.

I had to commit the Navigate Back and Navigate Forward to memory [Ctrl+-] / [Ctrl+Shift+-], but they were the only buttons in the "Standard" toolbar that I used.

Eric Hexter said on 8.04.2008 at 9:04 PM

How about dumping your current settings as a VS Theme.? That is the quckest way to load up a new system and retain your settings.

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