30 comments
.NET 
As we found out today, the default settings for Visual Studio 2005 Professional are to not show the solution by default. This means that as soon as you add a project to a blank solution, the solution disappears and you are unable to add another project.
This is easy to fix though:
Make sure that you have the option to “Always show solution” set in your IDE. To do this, goto tools->options->Projects and Solution and check the “Always show solution” option.
I don’t understand though, that this is a default setting… wo could possibly live in the Professional environment with only one project per solution?? For an express edition, I could imagine this to be useful.. but otherwise, No!
30 comments
Thanks, I used VS 2005 for the first time today and this was the first problem I had
Charles Perry
awesome. i knew i wasn’t loosing my mind. somehow i had five projects in one solution, rebooted, and then i could only open one at a time when i opened the solution again. thanks!!
jeremy
That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. Why wouldn’t you default it to always show… typical of Microsoft to make a dumb decision like that.
DogMan
I’m glad I found this page because I was losing it too. 🙂
Dave
Man, I was about to re-install Visual Studio… I would think that would be checked by default.
Adrian
Gr8. I was surprized, how to add more projects in my web solution. This was really helpful in viewing the solution in the solution explorer.
Gaurav
I couldn’t find the “Project and Solution” section for the longest time. Then, I saw the little checkbox, tucked away at the bottom, that says “Show all settings”. So by default, you can’t even see the “Project and Solution” settings.
Ray
This drove me insane for about half an hour. Thank you so much!
Jim
hi !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I was also facing the same problem…
this shud not be the deafault setting…. its really dumb thing I have ever seen
…
thanx a lot for sharing information,….
Shekhar- INIQUUS- PUNE
Thank you!! I thought I was going crazy.
DirtyWhiteBoy
i developed a database using ASP.NET and SQL. whenever i open my default file it takes different local host number. how to stop this?
s.suresh
Thanks, this helped me to fix my problem.
Vikram
Thanks, great to find your post. I was wondering how much time it will take to fix this issue , using google, 2 minutes only.
Cheers
A
Ajay
Thanks. Exelent tip!
Max
At least you can open your solution. After installing VS2005 SP1 on Vista 32,
I can’t open the solution files! I’ve deleted the sou to no avail.
I haven’t tried rebooting but this is after I booted up in the morning. How buggy.
pickedaname
great….I had a DLL project , and had a separate project for debugging. Now they are in one solution. Thanks a lot.
kenboo
Thank you. I was playing with it and it drived me crazy. Why Microsot did anything like that. STUPID!!!
Thank you so much!
Petr
Out of the box thinking if this was not a default setting. Did someone say productivity??
Harsa
Thanks by the info, simple but useful.
Nahuel
Thank you!
One of the stupidest “features” I’ve ever seen.
Why would one ever want to NOT show the solution, and so hide the other projects??
I want 40 mins of my life back.
Vlad
Thanks for posting this. I was just trying hook up multiple projects in a solution like I had done in VS 2003. I would say that it is pretty bone headed of Microsoft to hide this option. I’m glad I used solutions in VS 2003, otherwise I may have thought that one project was the best we could hope for.
Katherine
thanks buddy…this one made me go crazy….thanks for the info
Guru Syntel
Hero!
Agree with the sentiments about the default setting being to not show the solution structure. As Bill Gates might say, “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard.”
James Collett
Thanks! This tip is still useful for VS2008 too!
Ted
Thanks for a quick tip.
Jakub
Thank Raimond. Just discovered your explaination. I agree with others who’ve suggested this is one of the dumbest changes every in a Microsoft product. You have to wonder what moron in Redmond approved hiding the solution as the default?
mikeg3
Thanks Raimond, fixed the problem in no time with this tip.
– Wouter from Unive
Wouter
Grr. I just had the same problem.. knew there had to be a setting somewhere.. was about to re-install thinking surely it wouldnt be set like that by default.
Rob
Thanks
Ranish.P
Great!!! It works….
Deepu Nair