How do I REALLY reset the Visual Studio window layout?

Question

I had a plugin installed in Visual Studio 2008, and it created some extra dockable windows. I have uninstalled it, and I can\'t get rid of the windows it created - I close

Answer 1

Note: if you have vs2010 and vs2008 and you want to reset the 2008, you will need to specify in command line the whole path. like this:

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 9.0\Common7\IDE\devenv.exe" /resetsettings

If you don't specify the path (like devenv.exe /resetsettings), it will reset the latest version of Visual studio installed on your computer.

Answer 2

I close them, but they always come back

When you say "they always come back" do you mean "next time you restart Visual Studio" or "immediately"?

One quirk of Visual Studio (at least VS2005) is that settings aren't saved until you exit. That means that if VS crashes at all while you are using it, any layout changes you made will be lost. The way around this is to always gracefully exit when you have set up everything like you want it to be.

Not sure if this will help your particular situation though.

Answer 3

Have you tried this? In Visual Studio go to Tools > Import and Export Settings > Reset all settings

Be sure you back up your settings before you do this. I made the mistake of trying this to fix an issue and didn't realize it would undo all my appearance settings and toolbars as well. Took a lot of time to get back to the way I like things.

Answer 4

If you want to reset your development environment of your visual studio, then you can use Import and Export setting wizard. see this for all steps:

http://www.authorcode.com/forums/topic/how-to-reset-development-environment-settings-of-your-visual-studio/

Answer 5

If you want to reset the window layout. Then

go to "WINDOW" -> "RESET WINDOW LAYOUT"