Tip: How to add shortcut/hot key to open Source Control explorer in Visual Studio

Although we currently have various ways to open Source Control Explorer in Vistual Studio IDE, I though it would be nice to have a shortcut or hot key to open Source Control Explorer (as we access it frequently for various needs while working in team environment). We can seet that, View->Other Windows-> Source Control Explorer does not have any shortcut key associated with it like other options do. But VS team has not left us without options to add/update these shortcut keys at our will. Here is how we can add our own shortcut key to open Source Control Explorer,

1. Navigate to Tools->Options->Environment->Keyboard
2. Type view.tfssource in "show commands containing" criteria and we can see respective command listed in the results list 
3. Place cursor in "Press shortcut keys" text box and type in the key that you like to use as shortcut (make sure that, you are providing a key which is not currently being used) and click on Assign and OK buttons.

Now we can directly open the Source control by hitting our custom shortcut key. We can follow similar steps to have our own custom shortcut keys for any feature that has an associated command.

HTH.

Tip - Solution name is invisible in solution explorer!!!!

Ever wondered why you are not able to see the solution name in order to add more projects after adding first project to the solution ?? Show All files also doesnt get the Solution back..Here is a tip to get it back...


Go to Tools->Options ->Projects and Solutions ->General and select Always show solution checkbox ..thats it!! any guess, why would this not be a default setting for VisualStudio??


Anyways, go ahead and explore all the Visual Studio menu items once to get to know more of such environment settings.

HTH