Solution and Project Management

A Project

We have seen how to create a console application. Microsoft Visual C# allows you to create various other types of applications. This is why you should first display the New Project dialog box to select your option. Besides console applications, in future lessons, we will start some applications with the Empty Project. We will also learn how to create a library using the Class Library option. We will ignore the other three options in this book.

To control the indentation of your code, on the main menu, click Tools -> Options... In the left list, expand C#, followed by Formatting and click Indentation. Then change the options on the right side:




Saving a Project

In previous versions of Microsoft Visual C# (namely 2002 and 2003), you always had to formally create a project in order to use one and you always had to save it. After realizing that many of the projects that developers
or students create are for experimental purposes, Microsoft provided the ability to only temporarily create a project, then to save it or not. Saving a project allows you to keep on a medium so you can refer to it later.

When Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 (any edition) is installed, it creates a folder named Visual Studio 2008 in your My Documents folder. The My Documents folder is called your personal drive or your personal directory. Inside of the Visual Studio 2008 folder, it creates a sub-folder named Projects. By default, this is where it would save your projects, each with its own folder.

To save a project, on the Standard toolbar, you can click the Save All button . Alternatively, on the main menu, you can click File -> Save All. If the project had already been saved but you want to save it under a different name, on the main menu, you can click File -> Save project name As...