Visual Studio Tip: Spice Up the IDE

Developing .NET applications is fun stuff. However, if you're like me sometimes using the same tools every day can get a little boring. That's why I often like to spice things up by changing the look of my IDE. Lucky for us, Visual Studio makes it easy to change the look of your development environment in just a few clicks. By heading to Tools | Import and Export Settings... you can export and save a backup of your current settings (a recommended practice before trying out any new settings) or import new settings from a file. These settings are saved in a special file with a .vssettings extension.

If you're anything like me you probably don't have much sense for what colors schemes and fonts look good together, nor do you have the time to spend hours trying different combinations until you get just the right look. That's why I go out to the web and download settings that others were kind enough to create and make available. I've used a dark color scheme for a while and am quite happy with it. Several people have asked me for a copy of my settings, and so I'm happy to provide them to you here:

Download: [settings]

*note: in order to use these exact settings, you must download and install the Envy Code R font by Damien Guard.

If you are interested in other font and color schemes, go out and find your own, or check out some of these links:

• The Dark Side by Dave Reed
• Another dark color scheme by Roy Osherove
• Several color schemes by Tomas Restrepo
• A light and dark color scheme by Jeff Atwood
• A dark color scheme by Scott Hanselman

Happy coding!