I’ve been using Visual C# 2008 Express on my laptop (the full thing is outside of my budget at the moment), but it meets my needs quite well. However, while trying to diagnose a problem with one of my tests in NUnit (which I think is fabulous) I went back to Visual C# Express with line number in hand ready to find the problem. Of course, the line numbers aren’t shown by default in Visual Studio.
Fortunately I had dealt with the problem before (in the full version of Visual Studio) and knew that it was a “per language” setting, which I always thought was kind of odd, but maybe most people don’t like seeing the line numbers for all their files (why?). Anyway, I went looking, but I couldn’t find it. Frustrated I jumped on my favourite search engine and quickly found the solution to my problem. Under the list of option categories there is a little checkbox labelled “Show all settings”.
Checking this box gave me a bundle of extra options, including the ability to display line numbers (Text Editor » C#, then the “Line numbers” checkbox under Display). But I must ask, why is this some sort of advanced hidden option??
So in future if I’m expecting an option to be show I will look for the magic “Show all settings” checkbox!
Thanks for the solution. It took me a while to figure out where the “Show all settings” checkbox was. For some reason I never scrutinized that part of the dialog box. The checkbox is located in the lower left, parallel with the OK button.
Greg
Yeah, leave it to M$ to hide one of the most useful features. Most editors have it enabled at default, or at least make it very easy to turn on. I just don’t know what they’re thinking…
Thanks! (Dang hidden settings…)
Same problem, and yours was the first hit on Google. Thanks.
God knows why someone would disable this by default because of the typed language. Beats me.
Thanks for the help!
Some hours with MS Help and don’t find solution.
One search in google and find your post with the solution.
Thanks for your post
Follow this Option
Tool – > Option -> Text Editor -> C#
Check the Line Number.
Ah. Thanks a MILLION. dumb mystery navigation.
Thanks for the help too! I’ve spend too much time looking for this feature. I don’t understand microsoft’s logic… Or maybe it’s simple as “the user need something basic because he can’t deal with too much parameters”. (???)
Awesome….
I found this thru google
one click…soln found…
MS guys …are stupid in some ways….
You are fabulous, thank you so much for this post. I have been looking in many books, many site, and then you have the answer, short and sweet. Thanks again, you rock!
You are the first best explanation on Google. Thank you, its greatly appreciated.
This post helped me find (in my version of VC# Express):
Tools/Options/Text Editor/All Languages/General/LineNumbers
Thank you for helping me along!
Excellent! Thank you. Can’t think without line numbers and agree that it should not be a hidden setting.
Thank you, couldn’t find this useful feature at first but finally <3
Been trying to figure this out for two days now, searching msdn and everything else….. Should have googled first! Thank you very much for your post!!!!
A setting to show all settings?! Wow. Who thought that was a good idea?
Anyway, thanks!
thx
THANK YOU BUDDY!!!
Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. I thank you. So bleeding obvious and so easily overlooked.
ThankYou();
Same here. Thanks for posting this.
Microsoft seems to have this mentality of hiding settings to avoid scaring users. It is ridiculous to have to enable menu options to show up.
Seeing this mentality spread to development tools makes me sad.
You saved my life
Thanks, I haven’t even seen this check box. Crazy guys @ MS…
I can’t imagine there is one single developer on this world who can work without line numbers in the editor.
Thanks! i overlooked it before now.
For anyone who is wondering;
The “Show all settings” check-box is at bottom left of the “-Tools -Options” Menu.
And as other’s have said, after enabling “Show all settings”; look under:
-Text Editor
-C#
-Check the option on left called “Line Numbers”
-click “Ok”
thanks again,
dan
lol Microsoft @ hide unneccary checkbox away from the rest of the Dialog box. nice. Thanks for your post, 3 seconds on google.
thanks verymuch!
thanks
Thanks for this. Exactly the answer I was looking for!
Thanks for this handy tip. Why this isn’t just under “View->Line Numbers” like every other tool I’ve used, I don’t know?!
return Thanks();
Thanks. Weird that this isn’t enabled by default…