DialogSample

title	description	date
Dialog Sample reference	A reference for Dialog sample	2023-10-24

Walkthrough: Dialog Extension Sample

This extension is a simple extension that shows how a command that shows a dialog can be quickly added to Visual Studio.

Command definition

The extension contains a code file that defines a command and its properties starting with the VisualStudioContribution class attribute which makes the command available to Visual Studio:

[VisualStudioContribution]
public class MyDialogCommand : Command
{

The CommandConfiguration property defines information about the command that are available to Visual Studio even before the extension is loaded:

    public override CommandConfiguration CommandConfiguration => new("%DialogSample.MyDialogCommand.DisplayName%")
    {
        Placements = [CommandPlacement.KnownPlacements.ToolsMenu],
        Icon = new(ImageMoniker.KnownValues.Dialog, IconSettings.IconAndText),
    };

The command is placed in the Tools top menu and uses the Dialog icon moniker.

The dialog is shown when the command is executed using the Shell helpers:

    public override async Task ExecuteCommandAsync(IClientContext context, CancellationToken cancellationToken)
    {
        // Ownership of the RemoteUserControl is transferred to VisualStudio, so it should not be disposed by the extension
        #pragma warning disable CA2000 // Dispose objects before losing scope
        var control = new MyDialogControl(null);
        #pragma warning restore CA2000 // Dispose objects before losing scope

        await this.Extensibility.Shell().ShowDialogAsync(control, cancellationToken);
    }

The dialog title and buttons can be customized as well, but are left as the default in the sample. You can refer to Dialog for more information about setting up a dialog.

Dialog content creation

The dialog content is created as a DataTemplate .xaml file and a separate control class .cs file:

<DataTemplate xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
              xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
              xmlns:vs="http://schemas.microsoft.com/visualstudio/extensibility/2022/xaml"
              xmlns:styles="clr-namespace:Microsoft.VisualStudio.Shell;assembly=Microsoft.VisualStudio.Shell.15.0"
              xmlns:colors="clr-namespace:Microsoft.VisualStudio.PlatformUI;assembly=Microsoft.VisualStudio.Shell.15.0">
  ...
</DataTemplate>

internal class MyDialogControl : RemoteUserControl
{

The .cs and .xaml files should have the same name (MyDialogControl in this sample). Additionally the xaml file should be included as an EmbeddedResource instead of a Page, so editing the csproj file may be necessary in some cases.

You can refer to Add content to a tool window to learn more about setting up the tool window content and remote UI.

Resource dictionaries

The extension also shows how to reference a resource dictionary from a Remote UI control:

internal class MyDialogControl : RemoteUserControl
{
    public MyDialogControl(object? dataContext, SynchronizationContext? synchronizationContext = null)
        : base(dataContext, synchronizationContext)
    {
        this.ResourceDictionaries.AddEmbeddedResource("DialogSample.Resources.MyResources");
    }

The resource dictionary and its localized variants must be configured as embedded resources:

<ItemGroup>
  <EmbeddedResource Include="Resources\MyResources.*xaml" />
  <Page Remove="Resources\MyResources.*xaml" />
</ItemGroup>

Resources provided by the resource dictionary can be referenced as dynamic resources:

<TextBlock Text="{DynamicResource myDialogText}" />

Logging errors

Each extension part including command sets is assigned a TraceSource instance that can be utilized to log diagnostic errors. Please see Logging section for more information.

Usage

Once deployed, the Insert Guid command can be used when editing any code files. The command by default will be under Extensions menu.