Question

Visual Studio keeps trying to indent the code inside namespaces.

For example:

namespace Foo
{
   void Bar();

   void Bar()
   {

   }

}

Now, if I un-indent it manually then it stays that way. But unfortunately if I add something right before void Bar(); – such as a comment – VS will keep trying to indent it.

This is so annoying that basically because of this only reason I almost never use namespaces in C++. I can’t understand why it tries to indent them (what’s the point in indenting 1 or even 5 tabs the whole file?), or how to make it stop.

Is there a way to stop this behavior? A config option, an add-in, a registry setting, hell even a hack that modifies devenv.exe directly.

Answer 1

Here is a macro that could help you. It will remove indentation if it detects that you are currently creating a namespace. It is not perfect but seems to work so far.

Public Sub aftekeypress(ByVal key As String, ByVal sel As TextSelection, ByVal completion As Boolean) _
        Handles TextDocumentKeyPressEvents.AfterKeyPress
    If (Not completion And key = vbCr) Then
        'Only perform this if we are using smart indent
        If DTE.Properties("TextEditor", "C/C++").Item("IndentStyle").Value = 2 Then
            Dim textDocument As TextDocument = DTE.ActiveDocument.Object("TextDocument")
            Dim startPoint As EditPoint = sel.ActivePoint.CreateEditPoint()
            Dim matchPoint As EditPoint = sel.ActivePoint.CreateEditPoint()
            Dim findOptions As Integer = vsFindOptions.vsFindOptionsMatchCase + vsFindOptions.vsFindOptionsMatchWholeWord + vsFindOptions.vsFindOptionsBackwards
            If startPoint.FindPattern("namespace", findOptions, matchPoint) Then
                Dim lines = matchPoint.GetLines(matchPoint.Line, sel.ActivePoint.Line)
                ' Make sure we are still in the namespace {} but nothing has been typed
                If System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex.IsMatch(lines, "^[\s]*(namespace[\s\w]+)?[\s\{]+$") Then
                    sel.Unindent()
                End If
            End If
        End If
    End If
End Sub

Since it is running all the time, you need to make sure you are installing the macro inside in your EnvironmentEvents project item inside MyMacros. You can only access this module in the Macro Explorer (Tools->Macros->Macro Explorer).

One note, it does not currently support “packed” namespaces such as

namespace A { namespace B {
...
}
}

---

EDIT

To support “packed” namespaces such as the example above and/or support comments after the namespace, such as namespace A { /* Example */, you can try to use the following line instead:

 If System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex.IsMatch(lines, "^[\s]*(namespace.+)?[\s\{]+$") Then

I haven’t had the chance to test it a lot yet, but it seems to be working.