Visual Studio

How to create a Tool Window in Visual Studio

Pedro Rainho — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 14:17:12 GMT

After you create an Add-in you need to create a User Control

Then I will have to change the Connect.cs file

The first thing you need to do is declare 2 fields one for the window it self and other for the user control

private Window _toolWindow;
private MyAddInToolWindow _toolWindowControl;

Next you will need to change the OnConnection method. This method receives notification that the Add-in is being loaded. This method when it’s generated adds the necessary code to show a add-in icon in the Tools menu.

/// <summary>Implements the OnConnection method of the IDTExtensibility2 interface. Receives notification that the Add-in is being loaded.</summary>
/// <param term='application'>Root object of the host application.</param>
/// <param term='connectMode'>Describes how the Add-in is being loaded.</param>
/// <param term='addInInst'>Object representing this Add-in.</param>
/// <seealso class='IDTExtensibility2' />
public void OnConnection(object application, ext_ConnectMode connectMode, object addInInst, ref Array custom)
{
    _applicationObject = (DTE2)application;
    _addInInstance = (AddIn)addInInst;
    if(connectMode == ext_ConnectMode.ext_cm_UISetup)
    {
        ...
    }
}

Next I need to change this method to enable me to show my tool window. To do that I just need to do this:

/// <summary>Implements the OnConnection method of the IDTExtensibility2 interface. Receives notification that the Add-in is being loaded.</summary>
/// <param term='application'>Root object of the host application.</param>
/// <param term='connectMode'>Describes how the Add-in is being loaded.</param>
/// <param term='addInInst'>Object representing this Add-in.</param>
/// <seealso class='IDTExtensibility2' />
public void OnConnection(object application, ext_ConnectMode connectMode, object addInInst, ref Array custom)
{
    _applicationObject = (DTE2)application;
    _addInInstance = (AddIn)addInInst;
    if(connectMode == ext_ConnectMode.ext_cm_UISetup)
    {
        ...

    }
    else if (connectMode == ext_ConnectMode.ext_cm_AfterStartup)
    {
        CreateToolWindow();
    }
}

If connect mode is After Startup, I will show the tool window.

To show the tool window I just need to call method “CreateToolWindow2”. This method receives some parameters and one of the parameters is the “Namespace.Usercontrol”, in this case "MyAddin1.MyAddInToolWindow"

private void CreateToolWindow()
{
    if (_toolWindow == null || _toolWindow.Visible == false)
    {
        #region Load Tool Window
        object programmableObject = null;
        string guidString = "{73000449-0035-43ad-985F-A3071ECBC079}";
        Windows2 windows2 = (Windows2)_applicationObject.Windows;
        Assembly asm = Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly();
        _toolWindow = windows2.CreateToolWindow2(_addInInstance, asm.Location,
            "MyAddin1.MyAddInToolWindow",
            "MyAddin1", guidString, ref programmableObject);
        _toolWindow.Visible = true;
        _toolWindowControl = (MyAddInToolWindow)_toolWindow.Object;
        #endregion
    }
}

After the creation of the tool window don’t forget to do _toolWindow.Visible = true; other wise the tool window might now show :)

After this, just press run and test it.

And you can also dock the tool window.

Now, if you close the tool window and then open it again the tool window will not show. You will need to change the method Exec and add the CreateToolWindow().

/// <summary>Implements the Exec method of the IDTCommandTarget interface. This is called when the command is invoked.</summary>
/// <param term='commandName'>The name of the command to execute.</param>
/// <param term='executeOption'>Describes how the command should be run.</param>
/// <param term='varIn'>Parameters passed from the caller to the command handler.</param>
/// <param term='varOut'>Parameters passed from the command handler to the caller.</param>
/// <param term='handled'>Informs the caller if the command was handled or not.</param>
/// <seealso class='Exec' />
public void Exec(string commandName, vsCommandExecOption executeOption, ref object varIn, ref object varOut, ref bool handled)
{
    handled = false;
    if(executeOption == vsCommandExecOption.vsCommandExecOptionDoDefault)
    {
        if(commandName == "MyAddin1.Connect.MyAddin1")
        {
            handled = true;
            CreateToolWindow();
            return;
        }
    }
}

Now test it and you can close and the open the tool window and you will have no problems.

One other thing you can do Is show the icon in menu “View” instead of menu “Tools”, to do that just change the method OnConnection and where you have the string “Tools” just change it to “View” very simple :)

Here is where the icon will appear after this change.

This is a very fast tutorial, there are other in the web that explains everything, one other choice is check MSDN.

How to create an add-in in Visual Studio

Pedro Rainho — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 13:54:17 GMT

Create Add-ins is very simple

Create a project.

Then select the project as a Visual Studio Add-in.

And then follow the Wizard.

Here you choose the language, I’m going to user C#.

Here you choose where the add-in will work.

Here you choose the add-in name and description.

Here you choose how the add-in will work.

Here you choose the information you want to show when you do Help/About in Visual Studio.

Here is the final summary.

And finally our add-in is created. Just press run and you will have a icon of the add-in in Visual Studio Tools menu.

As you can see it’s very simple to create an add-in, basically it’s just Next, next, next.

Twitter API

Pedro Rainho — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 12:46:13 GMT

Recently, I join Twitter after some pressure at home and at work :). But since I don’t like to publish my life there, I’m doing this, I’m doing that, bla bla bla, I decided to view Twitter in a different perspective. I decided to view the Twitter API. While I was watching the Twitter API I discovered that there are lot’s of libraries that try to do a wrapper around the Twitter API, including .Net libraries.

One of the libraries I had recently looked and done some testes was Twitterizer. Twitterizer has a very easy interface BUT doesn’t support every Twitter method plus, the last version present in the site has some problems that raises and exception. (To solve this problem I had to dig into the issues and discovered there a zip will the working libraries)

So Here is my sample application it’s intention was test almost every method.

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using Twitterizer.Framework;

namespace TwitterSample
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            if (Twitter.VerifyCredentials("twitter_user", "twitter_password"))
            {
                Twitter twitter = new Twitter("twitter_user", "twitter_password", "my_app");

                PrintReplies(twitter);
                PrintFollowers(twitter);
                PrintFriends(twitter);
                PrintDirectMessages(twitter);
                PrintFriendsTimeline(twitter);
                PrintPublicTimeline(twitter);
                PrintUserTimeline(twitter);

                //post a message
                twitter.Status.Update("Testing 123, Testing");
            }
            Console.ReadKey();
        }

        public static TwitterUser GetUserInfo(Twitter twitter, string userId)
        {
            TwitterUser user = twitter.Status.Show(userId);

            return user;
        }

        public static void PrintReplies(Twitter twitter)
        {
            TwitterStatusCollection col = twitter.Status.Replies();

            Console.WriteLine("Replies");

            foreach (TwitterStatus status in col)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("------------------------------------------");
                Console.WriteLine("Created:                " + status.Created);
                Console.WriteLine("ID:                     " + status.ID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToStatusID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToUserID);
                Console.WriteLine("IsFavorited:            " + status.IsFavorited);
                Console.WriteLine("IsTruncated:            " + status.IsTruncated);
                Console.WriteLine("RecipientID:            " + status.RecipientID);
                Console.WriteLine("Source:                 " + status.Source);
                Console.WriteLine("Text:                   " + status.Text);
                Console.WriteLine("TwitterUser.ScreenName: " + status.TwitterUser.ScreenName);
            }
        }

        public static void PrintFollowers(Twitter twitter)
        {
            TwitterUserCollection col = twitter.User.Followers();

            Console.WriteLine("Followers");

            foreach (TwitterUser user in col)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("------------------------------------------");
                Console.WriteLine("Description:       " + user.Description);
                Console.WriteLine("Friends_count:     " + user.Friends_count);
                Console.WriteLine("ID:                " + user.ID);
                Console.WriteLine("IsProtected:       " + user.IsProtected);
                Console.WriteLine("Location:          " + user.Location);
                Console.WriteLine("NumberOfFollowers: " + user.NumberOfFollowers);
                Console.WriteLine("ProfileImageUri:   " + user.ProfileImageUri);
                Console.WriteLine("ProfileUri:        " + user.ProfileUri);
                Console.WriteLine("ScreenName:        " + user.ScreenName);
                if (user.Status != null)
                {
                    Console.WriteLine("Status.Text:       " + user.Status.Text);
                }
                Console.WriteLine("TimeZone:          " + user.TimeZone);
                Console.WriteLine("UserName:          " + user.UserName);
            }
        }

        public static void PrintFriends(Twitter twitter)
        {
            TwitterUserCollection col = twitter.User.Friends();

            Console.WriteLine("Friends");

            foreach (TwitterUser user in col)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("------------------------------------------");
                Console.WriteLine("Description:       " + user.Description);
                Console.WriteLine("Friends_count:     " + user.Friends_count);
                Console.WriteLine("ID:                " + user.ID);
                Console.WriteLine("IsProtected:       " + user.IsProtected);
                Console.WriteLine("Location:          " + user.Location);
                Console.WriteLine("NumberOfFollowers: " + user.NumberOfFollowers);
                Console.WriteLine("ProfileImageUri:   " + user.ProfileImageUri);
                Console.WriteLine("ProfileUri:        " + user.ProfileUri);
                Console.WriteLine("ScreenName:        " + user.ScreenName);
                if (user.Status != null)
                {
                    Console.WriteLine("Status.Text:       " + user.Status.Text);
                }
                Console.WriteLine("TimeZone:          " + user.TimeZone);
                Console.WriteLine("UserName:          " + user.UserName);
            }
        }

        public static void PrintDirectMessages(Twitter twitter)
        {
            TwitterStatusCollection col = twitter.DirectMessages.DirectMessages();

            Console.WriteLine("DirectMessages");

            foreach (TwitterStatus status in col)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("------------------------------------------");
                Console.WriteLine("Created:                " + status.Created);
                Console.WriteLine("ID:                     " + status.ID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToStatusID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToUserID);
                Console.WriteLine("IsFavorited:            " + status.IsFavorited);
                Console.WriteLine("IsTruncated:            " + status.IsTruncated);
                Console.WriteLine("RecipientID:            " + status.RecipientID);
                Console.WriteLine("Source:                 " + status.Source);
                Console.WriteLine("Text:                   " + status.Text);
                Console.WriteLine("TwitterUser.ScreenName: " + status.TwitterUser.ScreenName);
            }
        }

        public static void PrintFriendsTimeline(Twitter twitter)
        {
            TwitterStatusCollection col = twitter.Status.FriendsTimeline();

            Console.WriteLine("FriendsTimeline");

            foreach (TwitterStatus status in col)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("------------------------------------------");
                Console.WriteLine("Created:                " + status.Created);
                Console.WriteLine("ID:                     " + status.ID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToStatusID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToUserID);
                Console.WriteLine("IsFavorited:            " + status.IsFavorited);
                Console.WriteLine("IsTruncated:            " + status.IsTruncated);
                Console.WriteLine("RecipientID:            " + status.RecipientID);
                Console.WriteLine("Source:                 " + status.Source);
                Console.WriteLine("Text:                   " + status.Text);
                Console.WriteLine("TwitterUser.ScreenName: " + status.TwitterUser.ScreenName);
            }
        }

        public static void PrintPublicTimeline(Twitter twitter)
        {
            TwitterStatusCollection col = twitter.Status.PublicTimeline();

            Console.WriteLine("PublicTimeline");

            foreach (TwitterStatus status in col)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("------------------------------------------");
                Console.WriteLine("Created:                " + status.Created);
                Console.WriteLine("ID:                     " + status.ID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToStatusID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToUserID);
                Console.WriteLine("IsFavorited:            " + status.IsFavorited);
                Console.WriteLine("IsTruncated:            " + status.IsTruncated);
                Console.WriteLine("RecipientID:            " + status.RecipientID);
                Console.WriteLine("Source:                 " + status.Source);
                Console.WriteLine("Text:                   " + status.Text);
                Console.WriteLine("TwitterUser.ScreenName: " + status.TwitterUser.ScreenName);
            }
        }

        public static void PrintUserTimeline(Twitter twitter)
        {
            TwitterStatusCollection col = twitter.Status.UserTimeline();

            Console.WriteLine("UserTimeline");

            foreach (TwitterStatus status in col)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("------------------------------------------");
                Console.WriteLine("Created:                " + status.Created);
                Console.WriteLine("ID:                     " + status.ID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToStatusID);
                Console.WriteLine("InReplyToStatusID:      " + status.InReplyToUserID);
                Console.WriteLine("IsFavorited:            " + status.IsFavorited);
                Console.WriteLine("IsTruncated:            " + status.IsTruncated);
                Console.WriteLine("RecipientID:            " + status.RecipientID);
                Console.WriteLine("Source:                 " + status.Source);
                Console.WriteLine("Text:                   " + status.Text);
                Console.WriteLine("TwitterUser.ScreenName: " + status.TwitterUser.ScreenName);
            }
        }
    }
}

After some tests in this library I was disappointed because I wasn’t able to find the documentation and some other features that are supported by Twitter are missing.

Now when I’ve some free time I will do some tests to other library named Tweet#, and from what I’ve seen it’s much more complete and it’s fluent.

I’m doing this not only for fun, but to continue evolve and learn new things :) and if you saw this post, you know that this is Agilior culture.

Learn and evolve, learn and evolve.

So like I wrote, I’m learning a bit of Twitter because there are lots of client applications around Twitter but I haven’t saw any add-in that Integrates with Visual Studio and since I know few things :) about how to develop extensions and software factories to Visual Studio I decided to start my Twitter Add-in. I’m only in the beginning (testing libraries) but I will release more news soon. Also, I’m intend to create a series of posts to show how to create a VS add-in and in particular how I’m creating this Twitter Add-in.

Load and unload assemblies

Pedro Rainho — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 17:59:14 GMT

Last week, I had a problem that probably some .Net developer had faced. The problem consists in load and unload an assembly?.

Can I do that??? Well, I can’t do it in a simple way. One of the things that Assembly doesn’t support in unload, check this post to see why.

So, like I wrote, last week I was developing a new feature for a software factory and that feature consisted in get all references and do something else.

My recipe does something like this:

Get project assembly
Copy the assembly DLL to a location
Get all assembly references
Generate a file

Do number 1 is simple.

Do number 2 is also simple, but has a problem.

Do number 3 is also simple, but has a problem.

Do number 4 is simple.

I’m going to explain first problem number 3 then problem 2

The problem with number 3 it’s because I load a assembly and they I get referenced assemblies. To get referenced assemblies I just do:

Assembly assembly = Assembly.LoadFrom(@"c:\myAssembly.dll");
AssemblyName[] references = assembly.GetReferencedAssemblies();

This piece of code has a problem, since I’m loading the assembly and they get referenced assemblies the file myAssembly.dll is now locked this means that the next time I try to run number 2 I will get an exception and the file will not ne copied. And this is why I had problem number 2.

Now, how can I load the assembly and then unload that assembly so the file won’t be locked???

I came across some solutions.

One of the possible solutions is just copy the assembly to something unique like {GUID}.DLL and then load that {GUID}.DLL, and do everything I need to do, this way I won’t lock my file.
1. Problem: I will have the assembly {GUID}.DLL loaded (in memory) every time, and can’t delete file {GUID}.DLL, because it’s locked. And finally I can’t unload unless I close Visual Studio.
Why don’t I just load the assembly into an array of bytes and then load the assembly, like this:
```
Assembly assembly = Assembly.Load(File.ReadAllBytes(@"c:\myAssembly.dll"));
```
1. Problem: I can do this and my file will not be locked but that array of bytes will be in memory and my visual studio memory will grow every time I run that recipe. That memory will be released only when I close the Visual Studio.
I can load the assembly in a new AppDomain and then unload the AppDomain.
1. Problem: tThis was a strange problem and I don’t know why but I load the assembly in a new AppDomain and that assembly become part of the new AppDomain and the AppDomain.Current. This was strange. Don’t know if I was doing something wrong. Now since the Assembly is loaded in AppDomain.Current I wasn’t able to copy the file, because it was locked.
The last solution I came across to load the assembly and unload it. This solution Consists in create a new AppDomain and then use method DoCallBack:

Here it is the source code:

AppDomainSetup setup = new AppDomainSetup();
setup.ApplicationBase = ApplicationBasePath;

AppDomain newDomainReferences = AppDomain.CreateDomain("AppDomain", null, setup);

CallBackAssemblyReferences call = new CallBackAssemblyReferences(newDomainReferences, filepath);
newDomainReferences.DoCallBack(new CrossAppDomainDelegate(call.LoadAssemblyReferences));
AssemblyName[] assName = (AssemblyName[])newDomainReferences.GetData("AssemblyReferences");

AppDomain.Unload(newDomainReferences);

This solution enables me to do a callback in a different domain. My class CallBackAssemblyReferences just does this:

[Serializable]
internal class CallBackAssemblyReferences
{
    #region Members Variables
    private string assemblyFile;
    private AppDomain domain;
    #endregion

    #region Public Implementation
    public CallBackAssemblyReferences()
    {

    }
    public CallBackAssemblyReferences(AppDomain domain, string assemblyFile)
    {
        this.assemblyFile = assemblyFile;
        this.domain = domain;
    }

    public void LoadAssemblyReferences()
    {
        Assembly assembly = this.domain.Load(AssemblyName.GetAssemblyName(this.assemblyFile));

        domain.SetData("AssemblyReferences", assembly.GetReferencedAssemblies());
    }
    #endregion
}

This class has a constructor that receives the new domain I’m working on and the path to the assembly I want to load.

public CallBackAssemblyReferences(AppDomain domain, string assemblyFile)

Then I just have my callback method WITH NO PARAMETERS.

public void LoadAssemblyReferences()

This is the method that will be called when I do

newDomainReferences.DoCallBack(new CrossAppDomainDelegate(call.LoadAssemblyReferences));

The callback method only loads the assembly in the new domain and then sets data in the new domain. These data are the assembly references.

When the DoCallBack returns I just had to do

AssemblyName[] assName = (AssemblyName[])newDomainReferences.GetData("AssemblyReferences");

To get the references I had saved.

Finally I just unload the AppDomain.

Now I can run my recipe every time I need without lock the file and without decrease visual studio performance.

Software Factory – Guidance Migration from Visual Studio 2005 to Visual Studio 2008

Pedro Rainho — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 09:28:32 GMT

Before begin I have to give some credit to my friend Rodrigo Guerreiro because he helped me with this PROBLEM.

First I can say that I wasn’t able to find ANY information in internet about migration. Don’t know if I was looking in the wrong sites but i wasn’t able to find any information.

Now this post reflect what I did in order to create 2 MSI’s files that can be installed in Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio 2008. (One MSI to install in VS2005 and another to install in VS2008)

Notice that I didn’t had to migrate my solution to VS2008 in order to create a MSI that installs a factory in VS2008

These was my steps:

Go to the solution folder and, in my case, there was a folder with the project setup. What I did was copy that folder and rename it from XXXSetup to XXXSetup2008.
Inside the folder XXXSetup2008 I rename the file XXXSetup.vdproj to XXXSetup2008.vdproj
Then I edit file XXXSetup2008.vdproj (With notepad :)) and every place I had XXXSetup I rename it to XXXsetup2008 (Very Careful with this point because you can mess up with the project and start from the begining). In my case I just had to do this renames:
1. "ProjectName" = "8:XXXSetup" para "ProjectName" = "8:XXXSetup2008"
2. "OutputFilename" = "8:Release\\XXXSetup.msi" para "OutputFilename" = "8:Release\\XXXSetup2008.msi"
After this I open the solution in VS2005 and added the project XXXSetup2008.vdproj to my solution
With the project XXXSetup2008 selected.
1. In the solution explorer choose “Custom Actions Editor” icon
  1. A window will open with the following custom actions
    -- GuidancePackage[Install], [commit], [roolback], [uninstall]
  3. Click in every single one and on the properties window change it from /Hive=8.0 /Configuration="[TARGETDIR]xxx.xml" to /Hive=9.0 /Configuration="[TARGETDIR]xxx.xml"
Again with the project XXXSetup2008 selected
1. In the solution explorer choose “Launch Conditions Editor” icon
2. A window will open with the following Launch Conditions:
  1. Search Target Machine
  2. Launch Conditions
3. click in every single option (CSharp, RunTime, VS, .NetFramework, C# Language, Guidance Automation Extensions, VS.Net) and in the properties you will have to change every single place you have 8 (VS2005) change it to 9 (VS2008).
5. Here it is what you need to change:
  1. In CSharp change it from:
    SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0\InstalledProducts\Microsoft Visual C#
    To:
    SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0\InstalledProducts\Microsoft Visual C#
  2. In RunTime change it from:
    SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0\InstalledProducts\RecipeManagerPackage
    To:
    SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0\InstalledProducts\RecipeManagerPackage
  3. In VS.Net change it from:
    SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0\Setup\VS
    To:
    SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0\Setup\VS
  4. In VS.Net change it from::
    Visual Studio .NET 8.0 is not installed. Do you want to see information of the product? Click Yes to be directed to a web page, click No to exit.
    To:
    Visual Studio .NET 9.0 is not installed. Do you want to see information of the product? Click Yes to be directed to a web page, click No to exit.

Now Compile and create the MSI’s. The next step is test the Factory in a VS 2008 :) Hope I was able to help. Sure helped me.

How to get all projects that exists in a Visual Studio Solution

Pedro Rainho — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 12:36:40 GMT

Recently during a software factory development I had a problem, how can I get all projects that exists in a visual studio solution.

The only solution that I found was this:

public static Project[] GetAllSolutionProjects(Solution solution)
{
    if (solution == null)
    {
        return null;
    }

    List<Project> solutionProjects = new List<Project>();

    foreach (Project project in solution.Projects)
    {
        if (project.Object is Project)
        {
            solutionProjects.Add(project.Object as Project);
        }
        else
        {
            Project[] projects = GetAllVsProjects(project.ProjectItems);

            if (projects != null && projects.Length > 0)
            {
                solutionProjects.AddRange(projects);
            }
        }
    }

    return solutionProjects.ToArray();
}

private static Project[] GetAllVsProjects(ProjectItems items)
{
    if (items == null)
    {
        return null;
    }

    List<Project> solutionProjects = new List<Project>();

    foreach (ProjectItem item in items)
    {
        if (IsProject(item.Kind))
        {
            solutionProjects.Add(item.Object as Project);
        }
        else if (item.SubProject != null)
        {
            if (IsProject(item.SubProject.Kind))
            {
                solutionProjects.Add(item.SubProject as Project);
            }
            else
            {
                Project[] subprojects = GetAllVsProjects(item.SubProject.ProjectItems);

                if (subprojects != null && subprojects.Length > 0)
                {
                    solutionProjects.AddRange(subprojects);
                }
            }
        }
        else
        {
            Project[] projects = GetAllVsProjects(item.ProjectItems);

            if (projects != null && projects.Length > 0)
            {
                solutionProjects.AddRange(projects);
            }
        }
    }

    return solutionProjects.ToArray();
}


public static bool IsProject(Guid projectKind)
{
    //Visual Basic {F184B08F-C81C-45F6-A57F-5ABD9991F28F}
    //Visual C# {FAE04EC0-301F-11D3-BF4B-00C04F79EFBC}
    //Visual C++ {8BC9CEB8-8B4A-11D0-8D11-00A0C91BC942}
    //Visual J# {E6FDF86B-F3D1-11D4-8576-0002A516ECE8}
    //Web Project {E24C65DC-7377-472b-9ABA-BC803B73C61A}

    return IsWebProject(projectKind) || 
        IsVisualJSharpProject(projectKind) || 
        IsVisualCPlusPlusProject(projectKind) ||
        IsVisualCSharpProject(projectKind) ||
        IsVisualBasicProject(projectKind);
}

public static bool IsProject(string projectKind)
{
    if(string.IsNullOrEmpty(projectKind))
    {
        return false;
    }

    return IsProject(new Guid(projectKind));
}

public static bool IsWebProject(Guid projectKind)
{
    return projectKind.CompareTo(new Guid("{E24C65DC-7377-472b-9ABA-BC803B73C61A}")) == 0;
}

public static bool IsVisualJSharpProject(Guid projectKind)
{
    return projectKind.CompareTo(new Guid("{E6FDF86B-F3D1-11D4-8576-0002A516ECE8}")) == 0;
}

public static bool IsVisualCPlusPlusProject(Guid projectKind)
{
    return projectKind.CompareTo(new Guid("{8BC9CEB8-8B4A-11D0-8D11-00A0C91BC942}")) == 0;
}

public static bool IsVisualCSharpProject(Guid projectKind)
{
    return projectKind.CompareTo(new Guid("{FAE04EC0-301F-11D3-BF4B-00C04F79EFBC}")) == 0;
}

public static bool IsVisualBasicProject(Guid projectKind)
{
    return projectKind.CompareTo(new Guid("{F184B08F-C81C-45F6-A57F-5ABD9991F28F}")) == 0;
}

Can any one tell me if is there a simple solution to get all projects in a VS solution, because this seems to me too much code just to get all projects. Is there another way???

The projects I want are: Visual Basic, Visual C#, Visual C++, Visual J# and Web Project. I was only able to do this watching to the project kind property.

Is there another way???

Get the assembly name from VS project

Pedro Rainho — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 12:30:48 GMT

Here is how to get the assembly name from a project

  public static string GetProjectAssemblyName(Project project)
  {
     return project.Properties.Item("AssemblyName").Value.ToString();

Manual guidance uninstall

Pedro Rainho — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 07:29:38 GMT

if for some reason during GAX uninstall you get a error saying that you need to uninstall all guidance's before you uninstall GAX try open this file C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Application Data\Microsoft\Recipe Framework\RecipeFramework.xml and manually remove the guidance elements present in this file. After you manually remove the elements you are able to uninstall GAX.