• make .DSP and .DSW startable
• paint to pretty Black background with highliting
• make hot-keys to be Borland-like
• view cp-1251 or koi-8 sources
• features
• convert project from VC 7 (.NET) to VC 6
• create project for kernel mode driver
• set memory access breakpoint in Visual Studio Debugger

MS Visual Studio has project files - .DSP and workspace files - .DSW. .DSP contains list of sources and build rules. .DSW file contains list of project files. By default workspace files are opened by MSDev, but project files have no handler. I found it to be inconvenient. You can fix it by importing .REG file with content similar to shown below:

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\dspfile\shell\Open]
@="Open"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\dspfile\shell\Open\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files\\VC6\\MSDev98\\Bin\\msdev.exe\" \"%1\""

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\dspfile\shell\Open\ddeexec]
@="Open(\"%1\")"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\dspfile\shell\Open\ddeexec\application]
@="msdev"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\dspfile\shell\Open\ddeexec\topic]
@="system"

1. Click with right mouse button (or with left one if you have left-handed mouse) on any .DSP file.
2. Choose 'Open With...' in context menu
3. Choose item in list
4. Check 'Always use this program to open this file' option
5. Click 'OK'

Source editor:


#include "ora_common.h"

/* Define one logon data area and one cursor data area
Also define a host data area for olog.
(See ocidfn.h for declarations). */
Lda_Def lda;
Cda_Def cda;
ub4 hda[HDA_SIZE /(sizeof(ub4))];



Debug windows:


EAX = 009E0E80
EBX = 7FFDF000
ECX = 00000001
EDX = 009E0D90
ESI = 00000000
EDI = 00000000



These settings are stored under the following Registry keys:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\DevStudio\6.0\Format
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\6.0\Text Editor\Colors

Here are the archives with settings: vc6_black_colors.rar/tgz (1.4 Kb/1.5 Kb)

You can also change these settings via Tools -> Customize... -> Keyboard

It is just for fun. I like Borland-style keyboard layout (F7 - Step into, F8 - Step over, F5 - Go, etc.). These settings are stored here:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\DevStudio\6.0\Keyboard

Here are the archives with settings: vc6_borland_kbd.rar/tgz (1 Kb/1.1 Kb)

You can also change these settings via Tools -> Options -> Format

Install Fixed fonts with appropriate character sets and set up Visual Studio to use these fonts. Use "TermiBCB" or "CourBCB" for cp-1251 and "ER Kurier KOI-8" for koi-8. Of course, it is not very convenient. IMHO, Far (http://www.rarlab.com) internal editor is much better for this case.

I've found that many people doesn't know about very useful features. So I decided to list them here. Chose what you like. All options listed below can be found under Tools -> Options menu.

• Debug, Hexadecimal display. Use hexedecimal form by default.
• Debug, Display Unicode Strings. Show WCHAR[], PWCHAR, etc. as normal text string during debug.
• Debug, View floating point registers. Show math co-processor registers in Registers debug window.
• Compatibility, Enable copy without selection. Using Ctrl-C or Ctrl-Ins when no text is selected will place the whole current line into clip-board.
• Compatibility, Enable line-mode pastes. If clip-board contains entire line, Ctrl-V or Shift-Ins will place it before current line. Whithout this option the line will be inserted into current cursor position. This option is convenient together with previous one.
• Compatibility, Enable virtual space. Allows moving cursor beyond end of line. This options prevents changes of horisontal coordinate of cursor when scrolling to shorter lines.
• Workspace, Recent workspace list contains:. How many workspaces should VC remember and show under File -> Recent Workspaces.

See also:

• Creating VC6 project for kernel mode driver
• Migrating VC6 driver project to VC8 with DDK 2003