🏄 Stay 'in the flow' when you code with this ProTip:

Today I will share what is hands down, the most useful IDE mod I do to Visual Studio.

What it does: Gives you more of what I call "brainspace". That ability to keep up with what you were just doing a second ago without having to remember.

How many times have you been coding with intent and then you had to back-fill a dependency, or maybe just focus on what it takes to get a sub task done.

Then it's like... hmmmm where was that thing #1 I was just looking at, where I now need to paste this other thing #2 I had to go get. - or similar situation. Especially as you explore code using the goto definition feature to get around in a changing codebase.

This is a small picture of the ways it helps me every day. You will find your own too if you give it the old college try.

It literally saves thousands of dollars per project for each developer.

To set the keystroke assignments click your way to the options dialog here:

Tools \ Options \ Environment \ Keyboard

Search for Commands Containing: Navigation

Assign your shortcut keys like this...

View.NavigateForward = Control, Shift, and the big 'Plus key'(  +  ) on the numberpad.

View.NavigateBackward = Control, Shift, and the matching 'Minus key'(-) above it on the numberpad.

Now for the magic... you can now zip back and forth through the places you've just been. The placement of the two hotkeys uses two very accessible but unused motions to naturally give a mental muscle memory to where you are in the codebase. Like auto breadcrumbs of your thought process. As a bonus - It makes interruptions virtually painless to get "back where you were" mentally afterward.

Cheers and give it a bit of a try before ya knock it. { pun intended }