Quick Fix: “Find in Files” Button is Disabled

Okay, so this is a pretty simple one.  Perhaps I should have figured it out way, way faster than I did, and perhaps nobody else will ever have trouble with this, but I never promised to be helpful.  Or did I?

Anyway, here’s a pretty common scenario (around here, at least):

1. Fire up Visual Studio 2010.
2. Hit CTRL + SHIFT + F to bring up the Find and Replace dialog in “Find In Files” mode.
3. Type a keyword that will bring up the area in your project you want to work with.
4. Hit Enter.
5. Wait.
6. Finally notice that nothing is happening.
7. Hit Enter again.
8. And again.
9. Mumble “What the hell…?”
10. Reach for your mouse.
11. Notice the “Final All” button is disabled.
12. Say “What the hell?” a bit louder.
13. Click the button anyway.  (Nothing happens.)
14. Stare at monitor with angry / confused expression.

Here’s the problem: in Visual Studio 2010, the “Find All” button isn’t enabled until you’ve opened a text file of some description.  Once this happens, it will stay enabled until you close Visual Studio, even if you don’t have any documents open.  Yeah, it’s a bug.

Here’s a workaround:

1. Open any text document (code file, XML file, whatever).
2. Hit CTRL + SHIFT + F to re-open the Find and Replace dialog.

If you’re looking for a quick keyboard fix, try CTRL + N, ENTER, CTRL + SHIFT + F, CTRL + F4.

And please, if this helps you, leave a comment and let me know.  I’d really like to hear that I’m not the only person this bothers.

Visual Studio is Getting Expensive

Microsoft has made a lot of mistakes in its day, but one thing it’s always done right is to treat developers like royalty.  Giving developers really compelling reasons to choose Microsoft ensures that enterprises and consumers keep choosing Microsoft too, because that’s where all the programs are.

One of the best ways Microsoft does this is with Visual Studio.  It is the best development suite on the planet, bar none.  It lets developers make better products in less time, and it makes them not hate their jobs.  It keeps programming ‘fun’.  And traditionally, Microsoft has practically given this away.  Sure, if you walk into a store and look for a shrink-wrapped copy of Visual Studio, it’s pricy.  But nobody does that.  Through the Empower program, MSDN subscriptions, and more, Microsoft has kept Visual Studio very affordable, and takes off all the restrictions placed on mere mortals.  Which is good: developers are probably the least likely bunch of people to pirate software, and they don’t have time to worry about things like licenses and product activation.  They’re not using these products.  They’re building on them so other people can use them.

But this is changing.

Now, developers have to choose to either live with an ‘inferior’ version of Visual Studio, or pick which ‘Team’ edition to go with.  I’m sure the marketing department was really proud of the work they did identifying their market segments, but you know what?  That doesn’t work with developers.  Am I a Software Architect?  A Database Developer?  A Test Engineer?  It really depends on which day it is, but most often, I’m all of these.  And I really don’t like having to choose which features I want to live without, because this is exactly what is happening here.

Sure, I could go for the uber-premium ‘Team Suite’ edition, which does have it all.  But that costs many, many thousands, which is well beyond what any mere mortal can afford.  In fact, it’s a pretty good part of an annual salary most places in the world.  Visual Studio is great, but it ain’t that great.

And worse: the usual channels that developers used to avoid paying retail are slowly being closed, or at least weakened: most of these offerings no longer come with the top-tier edition.  More and more software is unavailable to developers through MSDN subscriptions (such as the Expression products), and often, developers can’t even get into beta programs.  I develop solutions that use Microsoft Office every day, and I didn’t see the web-enabled versions of these until public release.

All of this is happening at a time when the alternatives are getting harder and harder to ignore.  Macs are becoming a significant market segment again, much of the Linux world has rallied behind the fantastic Ubuntu distribution, and the development tools for non-Microsoft platforms are getting pretty damn good.  Sure, I’d rather use Visual Studio.  But by the time I’m paying more on Visual Studio than my rent, I think I can probably learn to live with Eclipse.  And if I do that, my products probably won’t require Windows anymore.  And if they don’t, neither will my customers.

I really hope Microsoft wakes up here.  These higher prices probably look good on a balance sheet; I’m sure the developer tools division at Microsoft is pulling in huge amounts of cash.  But this is a strategically damaging way of increasing revenue: you get a relatively small, yet concrete and immediate, gain in one corner, but you’re slowly, surely, weakening your entire foundation.

Microsoft: give us developers a break.  Try going in the other direction: give us more for less.  We’ll respond in kind.

Configuring Windows 7 AppLocker

Today, we have decided to post a video that will briefly go over how to use Windows 7 AppLocker. This is a great new Windows 7 feature that will make securing individual machines a lot easier.

Click below to learn more! You will want to follow along on your own computer to better see the settings as the video is small.

Offline Installer for Windows Live Essentials

I constantly find myself amazed at just how good some of the free applications included with Windows Live essentials are. I particularly like the movie maker which is easily as good as any of Mac’s offerings.

That being said, I am also constantly amazed at how annoying the online installs of some of these free programs can be – especially if you are installing the package on multiple PCs.

However, in the case of Windows Live Essentials, Ed Bott recently published a link to the offline installer on ZD Net for all to use.  Please find the link below

 Windows Live Essentials Offline

For those of you that have never used this package, I strongly encourage you to check it out. In fact, I have written all of these blog post’s on the Windows Live Writer and it is an essential tool for the maintenance of this website.

Enjoy the link folks!

Working with the Auto-Complete Cache

“Fire!!” “Earthquake!!” “Tornado!!” – all of these desperate screams for help pale in comparison to the shriek heard from end users after getting a new mail profile. As the words “Hey, my contacts are gone!!” come bellowing down the hall, many techies simply feel like packing up, retiring and heading for a more rewarding career – perhaps that of a trash collector or road sweeper. Truly, the world has come to en end if [insert_name_annoying_user_here]  has lost his contacts!

Or, maybe not. While it is true that there are few things that both irk and are more readily noticed than a missing auto-complete cache, the file itself is fairly easily managed. With a little bit of extra work, you will be able to avoid many of the pitfalls that plague IT administrators after a profile switch and you will also be able to help end users clean up or reset their cache completely.

Before we get going, however, it is worth noting that the auto-complete cache is simply that – a cache. As such, it has very little offered by Microsoft in terms of editing it and in Microsoft’s eyes is more of a temporary data repository rather than some sort of proper database. Don’t expect to get stellar support from Microsoft should this become corrupt – the official line is that all addresses should be kept in your address book or outlook contacts. As a matter of principle, I must admit that I too agree with this advice.

Nevertheless, users expect their cache to be manageable so let’s dive in and look at what can be done with this.

The cache itself is implemented in the form of a file that has the .NK2 extension and is named after the name of your outlook profile. By default, this name is likely going to be “outlook.nk2”, but be aware of other names. In Vista and Windows 7, you will find this located at:

“C:\ Users\UserName\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Outlook”   

in Windows XP     

“C:\ Documents and Settings\UserName\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook”      

In order to see this file, you will have to ensure that you have enabled the display of hidden files and folders.  (Learn how:Show Hidden Files)

So, once you have the directory open, it is likely that you will not see an auto-complete cache in that folder. Outlook only creates this after an email is sent and Outlook is closed and re-opened, so go ahead and send a test message to yourself, or whoever you see fit. This will cause an entry to be written to the .NK2 when Outlook is closed and reopened. After doing this, ensure that Outlook remains closed as having Outlook open will put a lock on this file and prevent you from renaming it.    

Now, take not of the name of the new .NK2 file. You will have to find the previous one from the old profile, move it to the new directory and rename it to the exact name of the new .NK2 file you have created. Go ahead and rename the new one to profilename.bak. Rename the old .Nk2 file to the name of the newly created one. Finally, reopen outlook and you should have all of the old auto-complete entries available.

Now, given this information, one of the easiest ways of creating a brand new .NK2 cache should the old one be corrupt, is to simply follow the procedure above and just rename the .NK2 file.

Another useful tidbit, is that individual entries in an an auto-complete cache can be deleted by simply hovering over the entry in the drop down and pressing the delete key while it is highlighted.

In Outlook 2010, Microsoft has also added a red X with which you may delete the entry by clicking on it. You can also get a brand new cache in Outlook 2010 by using the Outlook.exe /CleanAutoCompleteCache switch. Simply cut and paste this into the run box and you will end up with a brand new cache.

If you need more extensive editing capabilities of the .NK2 cache there are several free and relatively cheap editors out there that will allow the import of entries and correction in an easy to use editor.

So don’t worry about finding a pair of overalls just yet for your new career, there really are ways of dealing with the auto-complete cache.  I hope this little tutorial helps!

Cheers!