Useful Add-Ins or Plug-Ins for native Visual Studio developer [closed]

There are plenty of different Add-Ins for Visual Studio see Visual Studio Gallery . Please share your experiences and favorites.

As motivation, here are some of my favorites:

  • Versioning Controlled Build [F/O] - very handy extension for automatic build numbering
  • SlickEdit Gadgets [F] - useful editor gadget, build-in file explorer ...
  • SlickEdit Tools [C] - editing and versioning tools
  • Refactor! for C++ [F/C] - C++ code refactoring like C#
  • WiX [F/O] - making windows installer setups using XML
  • AnkhSVN [F/O] - use subversion from inside of your IDE
  • Visual Leak Detector [F/O] - helper for debug problems
  • Parasoft C++test [C] - suite for code quality assurance
  • Parasoft Insure++ [C] - runtime memory analysis
  • RockScroll [F] - helper for scrolling in long files
  • Axialis IconWorkshop [F/C] - icon and bitmap editor
  • PowerCommands [F] - adds some useful commands onto the context menu
  • IncrediBuild [C] - speedup your build process
  • Workspace Whiz [F/C] - many useful add-ins
  • Consolas Font Pack [F] - very nice font for programming
  • Intel Parallel Studio [C] - Intel optimized C/C++ compiler analyser and debug-helper
  • Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 IDE Enhancements [F] - only for VS2005, Outliner / C++ Snippets /...
  • codekana [F] - very similar with Visual Assist
  • Visual Local History [F] - local file history à la Eclipse
  • ResOrg [F] - Manage and Renumber Resource Symbol IDs
  • PVS-Studio [C] - static code analyzer, especially 64-bit code analysis (Viva64)
  • ASP.NET/HTML Spell Checker for VS [F] - spell checker.

Tools

  • Ranorex [C] - GUI testing and automation framework
  • OneTime [F/C] - Software project management
  • CppCheck [F/O] - Static analysis of C/C++ code
  • Online GUID Generator [F] - in case you need a GUID
  • WinMerge [F] - file / directory comparing
  • codepad [F] - online compiler
  • Cilk++ [F/C] - optimize your application for multicore processors
  • Microsoft Application Verifier [F] - runtime verification tool for native code
  • SourceMonitor [F] - simple code metrics measurement tool
  • WinUnit [F] - nice unit testing for native (C/C++) code on Windows
  • Very Sleepy [F] - simple code profiling tool
  • Visual Sidekick [P] - effective but cheap incremental search over symbols and files
  • CodeAnalyst [F] - code profiling tool from AMD (also partially works on Intel)
  • Sisulizer [C] - Visual Software Localization Tool
  • Innovasys HelpStudio Lite [F/C] - create Microsoft Help 2.x help systems.

For coffe break

  • Powder Toy [F] - build thrilling simulations yourself
  • OE-CAKE [F/C] - build fluid simulations yourself.

Your suggestions:

  • ViEmu [C] - VI emulation
  • Visual Assist [C] - "La Crème de la Crème"
  • VisualSVN [C] - very nice SVN provider
  • Visual Lint [C] - advanced static code analysis
  • VSFileExplorer [F] - self explaining
  • P/Invoke [F] - helps to find native code signatures for managed code.

[F] - freeware [O] - open source [C] - commercial.


I'm amazed that Visual Assist has not been mentioned yet!


ViEmu is my personal favorite. Emulates VI right inside of VS. :^)


Is nobody using Resharper? - Shame on you! ;-)

Seriously, you don't know what you're missing (I do, because I've yet to convince my boss to buy it, and my evaluation period has expired)

The addition of this tool to visual studio almost brings it up to the level of IntelliJ Idea for Java