Question

I’ve searched for an answer to this, and I may not be phrasing it correctly but how do I add my own ascx template (or any file template) in the “add new item” of Visual Studio?

I have a set of ascx files, which inherit a custom class – This all works fine, however when I add a new ascx, I then have to go into the code behind and edit this to have the new inheritance plus a couple of other standard parts in the page_load.

Is there a way I can add my own ascx template which will have all this setup for me?

Answer 1

The answer can be found in the MSDN documentation:

To add a custom project item template to the Add New Item dialog box

1. Create or open a project in Visual Studio.

2. Add an item to the project and modify it if you want to.

3. Modify the code file to indicate where parameter replacement should take place. For more information, see How to: Substitute Parameters in
   a Template.

4. On the File menu, click Export Template.

5. Click Item Template, select the project that contains the item, and click Next.

6. Select the item for which you want to create a template, and click Next.

7. Select the assembly references to include in the template, and click Next.

8. Type the icon file name, preview image, template name, and template description, and click Finish.

   The files for the template are added to a .zip file and copied to the
   ..\Users\username\Documents\Visual Studio
Version\Templates\ItemTemplates\ folder.