CodeMaid

Hey Steve,
I seem to be getting a bug where once-in-a-while I'll hit undo a few times rapidly and VS2010 will completely freeze up. I can't say for certain that it's CodeMaid, but when it freezes, the status bar always says that CodeMaid is cleaning the file. Is this a known issue?
(Your add-on is a god-send, by the way)
Cheers

Hi fasdewx -

I haven't heard of that issue before.  CodeMaid usually won't be running during an undo operation.  The possible exception that comes to mind is if the undo causes a save, which with the automatic cleanup on save option enabled would cause a cleanup to run.  Visual Studio will automatically save the code during refactoring operations (ex: rename) but from what I can see they don't put those actions into the undo stack.

A few things you could try to get more information:
1.  Is the status bar still showing the cleaning message from a previous operation before you undo, or is it starting cleaning during the undo?
2.  If you disable the option to run automatic cleanup on save and run for awhile, do you still see the issue?
3.  Are files being opened and closed during the undo operation?

Very glad to hear you're enjoying CodeMaid. :)  Please let me know if you get any more information about the possible issue.

Thanks,
-Steve Cadwallader

You may be onto something with the refactoring - it *just-now* froze when undoing a rename operation. I'm not sure on #1 (pretty tricky to look out for, given the rarity of crashes), and will try #2. As for #3, as far as I'm aware, no files are being opened or closed. I'll certainly keep an eye out and see if I can find something reproducible :)

Sounds good, keep me posted. :)

Hi, is there a way to hide those 4 commands from c++ code editor context menu? Thanks

Never mind, I figured it out, had to Reset All to get the editor context menu commands visible in customisation. And sorry about the wrong thread :( 

No problem Snake.Bite - glad you figured out how to customize the context menu. :)

Just an update: I disabled the option to run automatic cleanup on save and haven't had it freeze for 5 weeks now. 

Thanks for the update.

I've recently added a new configuration option which by default will disable removing unused using statements during the automatic cleanup.  It will avoid a few other issues that can occur and may also help with the issue that you were seeing.  The option will be available in the next release.

Hi

Have to say again (I wrote a while ago on Github) Well done and love it!

One thing that has me puzzled is what do the numbers mean at the end of a method on Snooper? I can't figure this out!

And as for suggestions, I would +1 on what someone else said below on sync region open/collapse... If I double click on something from a closed region, it will go to it - I would just like to see this added as it would "complete" it.

Less important would be to double click to select the entire method  and possibly a few other tweaks such as drag to reorder... but, less bothered on that.

In addition, Maybe I need to choose a better font/colour scheme, but, after clicking, sometimes it still takes me a few seconds to focus/work out where I should be looking - it would be great if you could do something like highlight a colour then fade back to default.

Also, one little bug, but, it could be me and if it isn't it is so minor, I wouldn't worry! - I just upgraded to 0.3.7, setup told me to restart, but, I didn't! I went straight in the CodeMaid menu, it states 0.3.6, but the about page says 0.3.7 - perhaps a restart will fix this, if it doesn't, again, so minor, but, thought you may want to know!

Sorry, didn't know it would loose formatting :( Looks like an ugly wall of text :( ... All the suggestion... Don't mean to sound ungrateful and want to say again, thanks for such a great addon!

Hi William - 

Thanks for the compliments, glad you're enjoying it. :)  Yeah the newline stripping here in the forum is annoying - hopefully they fix that soon.

The numbers in the snooper are McCabe complexity scores.  If you're not familiar with them you can read more here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclomatic_complexity .  It will be a little more obvious what those numbers mean in the next release with some better tooltips.

I've actually been working on a rewrite of the snooper for the next big release.  It is now WPF based and will run asynchronously for supporting larger files.  Drag to reorder is one of the features I'm planning to include but haven't implemented yet.  The styling has been redone and there are some new configuration options including controlling where the element is shown (centered on name or centered on whole element) that you may find helpful.  I'll bump the region syncing up the priority list - I'm not sure if it will make it into the first release.

You do need to restart Visual Studio for the menu items to get updated and show the correct version number - so that should take care of it.

Suggestions are always welcome so no offense taken. :)  Thanks for the recommendations and keep me posted if you think of any others.
-Steve Cadwallader

Dear Steve, I hope I'm not going on your nerves. But after using the extension now for some time there's one thing I find annoying. IMHO, the primary purpose of the snooper is navigation. Now when I click on any item there, it takes me to the line that contains this item. But the editor does not have the focus, so I have to click once more in the editor. Actually the editor has some kind of half-focus; you can see this when highlighting the current line. I'm obviously able to move around with the arrow keys, but cannot write. My suggestion would be to place the cursor at the beginning of the item's name ready to write. And while you're at it, it would be even greater to center this line then instead of having it at the top (ReSharper style). Cheers, Tobias.

Hi Tobias - 

No worries about the nerves, but maybe I should start a frequent flyer club? ;)  Seriously though, I do appreciate the feedback.

I've seen the focus issue you are talking about and anticipate having it resolved in the next release.  As for the editor window scroll position I chose to put the element at the top of the screen so the maximum amount of code would be visible for large elements (ex: a complex method).  I will add it to the backlog to look into extending the calculation to center smaller elements.

Thanks for the input,
-Steve Cadwallader 

That's good to hear; it'll make me much more productive. ;-)

You got a point there with the scroll window positioning, sure. But it's strange when use also use other plugins that behave differently. May it could become a configurable option?

Thanks, Tobias

Hi Tobias -

I was thinking of looking into making the whole element centered on the screen (vs. starting at the top) as a compromise between the two approaches.  That way the largest amount of the element is visible, and it is in the center of the screen as well.  It is a little different than others which just put the starting line in the center of the screen and half of the screen is wasted for large elements.  What do you think?  Otherwise I can certainly put in an option to have it simply be at the top or center of the screen.

Thanks,
-Steve Cadwallader

Yes, I think that'll be better than on top. Nevertheless I think, an option to have it exactly in the middle would be helpful to some. At least my spinal cord would then be instantly looking at the correct line. :-)
Anyway, correct focus has priority to me.

Well I'd hate to cause spinal issues. ;)  I'll be sure to include an exactly-middle line configuration option.

Hi Steve, I'm back with new suggestions. First, I'd like to see the folding of regions synchronized between the editor and Snooper (optionally) in both ways. Another thing falling in the region category would be the following. Close all manually created regions (i.e. all #region tags). To get an overview I like to close everything too see my “headings”. Unfortunately, VS does not provide this. Pressing Ctrl+M, Ctrl+O does too much. This also closes all summaries and bodies. Do you get what I mean? If I wrote “#region” four times in a file, then only four folds should be closed, the rest should remain unchanged. I'd even like to have a dedicated button in the Snooper for that.

Regards,
Tobias

Hi Tobias -

Thanks for the additional suggestions :).  I've added the first (synchronize expand/collapse state between code and snooper) to the backlog.  For the second I believe Visual Studio will do that by default when you open a document, but it isn't one of their Outlining options so you can't get back to it.  The option I'm thinking of is under Tools->Options->Text Editor->C#->Advanced->Enter outlining mode when files open.  Is that the feature you're thinking of, just accessible again after the file is open?

Thanks again,
-Steve Cadwallader

Hi Steve, I know the feature that you mentioned, but it only sometimes works for me. Maybe because of ReSharper remembering folds solution-wide or something similar. According to the MSDN, the “first time a file is opened, #regions blocks and inactive code blocks collapse.” This sounds like the feature I'm looking for. But as you say, it's not available on demand. But it'll probably be a function easily available to a plugin?

Hi Tobias -

I took a quick look through the VS API and did not see any access to that functionality.  Invoking the existing commands (ex: collapse to definitions) is available but that can already be easily done.  There is the API for manually collapsing a selected region of text but it will take a little more work and may have consequences to the current document state.

I'll add this feature to the backlog and dig deeper at that time to see what other options may be available.

Thanks for the suggestion,
-Steve Cadwallader

Hi, I like that tool very much. The Snooper has replaced the CodeMap plugin that I was using. But there is one thing that I miss since switching: CodeMap had a dedicated icon for constructors (green plus) so that you could spot them very quickly. I'd love to see that feature added.

And a second thought: As you're rewriting files anyway, how about changing order of elements? Like fields before properties before constructors before public methods etc. or private->protected->public? Similar functionality is offered by Regionerate.

Thanks for sharing!

Hi primfaktor -

I'm glad to hear you're enjoying CodeMaid.  I'm currently using Visual Studio's conventional icons in the Snooper window, but I agree it would be nice for constructors to stand out.  I think it would also be helpful to depict additional things, such as which methods are static.  I've looked for alternate icon sets in the past but didn't really find anything in the public domain.  If you happen to know of any please let me know.

I've got automatic reordering of code elements listed in my backlog.  Nobody has requested it before so I haven't prioritized it, but I'll give it a bump if you think it would be handy.

If you have any other suggestions for the snooper please let me know.  I'm actively working on a rewrite to make it load asynchronously and utilize WPF for a richer UI.

Thanks for the comments,
-Steve Cadwallader

Hi again. I would not change from the VS icon too much, because these are the ones we're used to and recognize instantly. Only some minor changes. I tried to do a little mock up; you can find it here:
http://imageshare.web.id/images/c3ewvcsdh9e0b61mii.png

I did not know the font settings used, so it looks a little weird. But you should get the idea. For the constructor icon I went an even easier way, I just recolored it.

One thing that just happened when writing the code for the mock up. I closed another file for the screenshot. It was the only other file opened and I did this by clicking its close icon without activating the tab first. Then the snooper window contents vanished. It then looked like this:
http://imageshare.web.id/images/ykolb3tckh49k1i4q9j.png

Hitting Ctrl+S on my test file did not bring back the content. I had to click the "{}" icon, then it came back. I think I observed this once before. When is the refreshing of the Snooper done, on saving?

Hi primfaktor -

Thanks for the mockups, I really appreciate you taking the time.  :)  I'll consider keeping the standard icons and making some variations for the additional states/information beyond what the built-in ones provide.

I have reproduced the bug you saw where the snooper window is not always populating when other documents are closed.  It currently catches window activation changes and save events to populate/re-populate itself, but apparently there is a scenario where the event is not getting raised as expected.  I should have that fixed in the next release.  As a workaround you can click the snooper window, then click back to the document.  That will raise the window activation events and the snooper should(tm) populate.

Thanks again for your input/mockups :)
-Steve Cadwallader

Hi, i just installed this tool and ran the Cleanup All Code command on one of my projects. It worked ok and I think this is a great tool.

Here are my suggestions:
1) Add a toggle for Inserting a blank line of padding before/after Auto-Implemented Properties in the Configuration.
2) Add the following file types to the default Excluded file types in the Configuration: .settings; AssemblyInfo.cs

Hi David -

Thanks, I'm glad you like it.  In regards to your first suggestion I agree that would be helpful and I would probably extend it to any single-line property vs. only auto-implemented properties.  I've added it to my backlog.  In regards to the second I am on the fence.  I tend to hand edit AssemblyInfo.cs files so I like to clean those up, but .settings files I don't generally utilize so I could see those.  I'll probably leave it as is for now unless I hear some more requests but you can (as I'm sure you already found) simply change it in your own configuration.

Thanks again for the nice feedback and suggestions,
-Steve Cadwallader

Hi, very, very nice and useful tool. Trying to reformat a couple of thousand of XML-files of various kinds in a couple of hundred projects. However - it's inconsistent when working with XML. It tends not to run the 'Format Document' command - but if I open the document and then use code maid to clean it, it works. It appears to work perfectly with C#. It's probably some kind of issue with the interaction with VS 2010. I looked at the code, and can't see any significant difference between how XML and C# files are handled in this case.

Any ideas, have you heard of anything like this before?

Hi Svante -

Thanks for the nice comments. :)

I haven't tried running that many XML files through at once, but I have done thousands of C# without issue. I haven't heard anyone else mention the issue. The best workaround that comes to mind is to do a project at a time - although not as nice as walking away.

I think you're probably right that a race condition is occurring where the document is not fully loaded so the format document command doesnt work as expected.

Let me know if you have any other thoughts or details.  Thanks,
-Steve Cadwallader

Hi Steve. Did a little deep-dive into the issue, downloaded the source and did some debugging and research. It turns out to be a problem. Consistently. It's in fact been reported in similar circumstances before, try google for "Edit.FormatDocument XML" (without the quotes). There are several links on the first page of hits that describe the problem. Essentially - if the extension opens the document window via code it fails. If it's open to start with it works. I'm actually a bit stumped, I've tried quite a few things in order to either understand the issue better and/or find a workaround. No go. It just won't play nice. Too bad, I'd have liked to contribute a fix, but I'll have to see myself beat at this time. I can't spend more time on the issue right now. Do you have any channels so this can be researched by the VS team in our lifetimes?

On another note, I have made a stand-alone utility that follows the reference dependency tree and builds solution files with all references included, and some similar operations. It has proven to be a great tool for refactoring large code bases, and in general to create clean and complete solution files for very large code bases. I've used in on a 200-project code base with great success. Seeing your nice VS add-in I see that it might be useful to integrate the two, to provide a 'Clean Solution' feature perhaps or something similar. Interested?

Hi Svante -

Do you think it could be an issue with the document not being fully loaded at the time that format document is called?  Perhaps there's a document loading event that can be caught, or some latency involved.  Which approaches did you try?

Can you tell me more about your add-in or point me towards it if it is publicly available?

Thanks,
-Steve Cadwallader

Hi! Yes, it's an issue with events occuring after the document being loaded. Strangely enough it seems to only affect XML documents. The issue is there as soon as automation + XML is involved, and I've not been able to figure out a way to wait for it to be ready. It appears to require some time idle in the user interface. I've tried delays both in the background thread and the UI thread, I've tried loading the document in either thread, I've tried various ways of simulating a 'get focus' in the document window in combination with delays, I've tried wating for 'input idle'. I've not even been able to get a keyboard macro to work. I am no automation expert, and I'm totally frustrated. The solution I have now for my immediate issue is to run a keyboard macro for each document, and then wait for the visual markers of collapse/expand to appear in the editor window - then Format.Document works, and only then. My solution builder is not an add-in at this time, and I've not yet published it but when I get the time I can put it up on CodePlex, or I can just send you a zip.

Hi Svante -

It sounds like you've covered all the bases that come to my mind as workarounds for the XML document loading issue you've seen.  The best remaining recommendation I have is to post it to Microsoft Connect and see what they have to say.  If you have a minimal reproducible solution that tends to get the best results.

Feel free to keep me keep me posted as you evolve your solution builder.  You can reach me more directly via e-mail to codemaid at gmail.

Thanks and good luck,
-Steve Cadwallader

How about a small help file? or at least a quick start. I've been using this tool for a couple of weeks, it's pretty intuitive, but still there are some stuff I don't know. 

E.g.: What does mean the number next to members in the "CodeMaid Snooper".

Great tool. Thanx!!

Hi Scaredfinger -

You're right, adding some documentation would be helpful.  I've been meaning to do it but keep putting it off because I'd rather be coding. ;)  I've bumped documentation back up the priority list and if you have any ideas for things you think should be mentioned in a quick start please feel free to let me know here or by e-mail to codemaid at gmail.

To answer your example - the numbers alongside methods and properties within CodeMaid's Snooper are McCabe cyclomatic complexity scores.  It is a metric that calculates the different number of branches within a block of code where the higher the number the more complex the logic.  For more details check out this wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclomatic_complexity

Very glad to hear you're enjoying the tool, thanks. :)
-Steve Cadwallader

Hello,

CodeMaid is a great product and thanks for the cool features!

I have a minor issue: Some VSTS solutions of ours need not CodeMaid run at all.  Is there a way to disable the tool in a particular solution? 

Thanks in advance and have a great one!

Hi codeguardian7 -

Thanks, I'm glad you like it. :)

There is not currently a way to set solution specific configurations for CodeMaid.  I am working on integrating CodeMaid's configuration with the Visual Studio export/import settings process which would be a step in this direction - but would still require a manual action.

If you're primarily concerned about the automatic cleanup, you can easily enable/disable that behavior in CodeMaid's configuration (CodeMaid->Configuration->Cleanup->General->Automatically run file cleanup on file save).  You can toggle this on/off as needed or leave it off and invoke code cleanup on demand as an alternative.

Hope it helps,
-Steve Cadwallader

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the quick reply! 

Your workaround will perfectly do for now :) 

Thanks again and keep up the great work!

Hi codeguardian7 -

Glad that it helps.  I've added solution-specific configurations to the wish-list backlog of things I hope to get to someday. :)

-Steve Cadwallader

Hi Steve, 

Ive been using your cool addin long time now, but recently I have encountered more of these dialog boxes when doing a rename refactoring in VS2010:
---------------------------
Microsoft Visual Studio
---------------------------
Binding failed because IntelliSense for source file 'G:\Dev\Main\Src\Borealis.Acos.Database.DataGenerators\EnumGenerator.cs' is out of date
---------------------------
OK   
---------------------------

I'm not 100% sure this is caused by CodeMaid itself rather than some integration between VS2010 and an addin.
The same problem is reported with users that have the Power Commands addin installed. However, I only have CodeMaid v0.3.4 installed.
see also this connect issue: http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/539445/renaming-an-event-handler-produces-an-error-dialog

Hi Rudi -

Thanks for the nice comment. :)  That issue is a new one on me, and like you say the little information available under the connect issue points to it being potentially related to extensions.  If you disable CodeMaid, are you still able to reproduce the issue?

Thanks,
-Steve Cadwallader

I am also having problem with this and VS2010. After uninstall of CodeMaid (0.3.6) error disappeared. 

Hi Tonka78 -

I can reproduce the issue as well, but unfortunately I do not have a resolution.  The exception occurs within Visual Studio's code after CodeMaid catches and automatically runs code cleanup.  A workaround is to disable CodeMaid's automatic cleanup on file save and perform cleanup manually.  Another workaround is to use a third party tool (ex: ReSharper) to perform renaming.

Without more information from Microsoft I'm not sure how to proceed with resolving this issue.  I have added comments to the existing Microsoft bug report here: https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/539445/renaming-an-event-handler-produces-an-error-dialog  I recommend you add your vote/comments to the issue to try and garner more interest from Microsoft in looking into it further.

Thanks for your report,
-Steve Cadwallader