Visual Studio VSIX Extension not showing in Tools menu

Question

I have been using an extension I really like in Visual Studio since version 2013. The extension is not maintained by its creator, but he posted the source code on GitHub. With every new version of Visual Studio I would do my best to update the extension so it would still work (I have no other experience with Extensions).

Unfortunately, in Visual Studio 2019, Microsoft deprecated one of the libraries that this extension depends on heavily (the Work Item Tracking). I've been trying to follow their migration guide but it only has a couple of code samples I could use (mostly involving Queries). Most of the code that needs converting is over my head (example: WorkItemStore or WorkItemCollection).

I have been able to get the project to build/compile successfully but due to the above, it has many warnings about the obsolete items ('QueryItem' is obsolete. For more information please see documentation at http://aka.ms/witclientom ). However, there are no build errors and I can install the extension.

Once installed, the extension can be seen (and uninstalled) via the Extensions - Manage Extensions page, and information about the extension can be seen in the Help - About screen. However, the extension SHOULD add two items to the Tools menu - and most of the time, it does not. I have somehow managed to get the items to show up a couple of times, but would get an exception when trying to access them (via either the Experimental Instance of Visual Studio or the regular one). When I stopped debugging to fix the error, then uninstalled, built, and re-installed the extension, the Tools menu items are once again missing. I do not know how to get them back, nor do I understand how to figure out why they are missing - presumably due to an error, but the debug/experimental instance is not helpful here as it doesn't break or show any errors.

Is there another way I can see why the Tools menu items are not showing up?

UPDATE: Here is the contents of my extension's.vsct file. I checked it, and it appears that each item has its own unique ID.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<CommandTable xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/2005-10-18/CommandTable" xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">

  <!--  This is the file that defines the actual layout and type of the commands.
        It is divided in different sections (e.g. command definition, command
        placement, ...), with each defining a specific set of properties.
        See the comment before each section for more details about how to
        use it. -->

  <!--  The VSCT compiler (the tool that translates this file into the binary 
        format that VisualStudio will consume) has the ability to run a preprocessor 
        on the vsct file; this preprocessor is (usually) the C++ preprocessor, so 
        it is possible to define includes and macros with the same syntax used 
        in C++ files. Using this ability of the compiler here, we include some files 
        defining some of the constants that we will use inside the file. -->

  <!--This is the file that defines the IDs for all the commands exposed by VisualStudio. -->
  <Extern href="stdidcmd.h"/>

  <!--This header contains the command ids for the menus provided by the shell. -->
  <Extern href="vsshlids.h"/>

  <!--The Commands section is where we the commands, menus and menu groups are defined.
      This section uses a Guid to identify the package that provides the command defined inside it. -->
  <Commands package="guidTeamPilgrimPkg">
    <!-- Inside this section we have different sub-sections: one for the menus, another  
    for the menu groups, one for the buttons (the actual commands), one for the combos 
    and the last one for the bitmaps used. Each element is identified by a command id that  
    is a unique pair of guid and numeric identifier; the guid part of the identifier is usually  
    called "command set" and is used to group different command inside a logically related  
    group; your package should define its own command set in order to avoid collisions  
    with command ids defined by other packages. -->

    <!-- In this section you can define new menu groups. A menu group is a container for 
         other menus or buttons (commands); from a visual point of view you can see the 
         group as the part of a menu contained between two lines. The parent of a group 
         must be a menu. -->
    <Groups>

      <Group guid="guidTeamPilgrimCmdSet" id="TeamPilgrimMenuGroup" priority="0x0600">
        <Parent guid="guidSHLMainMenu" id="IDM_VS_MENU_TOOLS"/>
      </Group>
    </Groups>

    <!--Buttons section. -->
    <!--This section defines the elements the user can interact with, like a menu command or a button 
        or combo box in a toolbar. -->
    <Buttons>
      <!--To define a menu group you have to specify its ID, the parent menu and its display priority. 
          The command is visible and enabled by default. If you need to change the visibility, status, etc, you can use
          the CommandFlag node.
          You can add more than one CommandFlag node e.g.:
              <CommandFlag>DefaultInvisible</CommandFlag>
              <CommandFlag>DynamicVisibility</CommandFlag>
          If you do not want an image next to your command, remove the Icon node /> -->

      <Button guid="guidTeamPilgrimCmdSet" id="toolTeamPilgrimExplorer" priority="0x0100" type="Button">
        <Parent guid="guidSHLMainMenu" id="IDG_VS_WNDO_OTRWNDWS1"/>
        <Icon guid="guidImages" id="bmpPic1" />
        <Strings>
          <ButtonText>Team Pilgrim Explorer</ButtonText>
        </Strings>
      </Button>

      <Button guid="guidTeamPilgrimCmdSet" id="toolTeamPilgrimPendingChanges" priority="0x0100" type="Button">
        <Parent guid="guidSHLMainMenu" id="IDG_VS_WNDO_OTRWNDWS1"/>
        <Icon guid="guidImages" id="bmpPendingChanges" />
        <Strings>
          <ButtonText>Team Pilgrim Pending Changes</ButtonText>
        </Strings>
      </Button>

      <Button guid="guidTeamPilgrimCmdSet" id="cmdTeamPilgrimExplorer" priority="0x0100" type="Button">
        <Parent guid="guidTeamPilgrimCmdSet" id="TeamPilgrimMenuGroup" />
        <Icon guid="guidImages" id="bmpPic1" />
        <Strings>
          <ButtonText>Team Pilgrim Explorer</ButtonText>
        </Strings>
      </Button>

      <Button guid="guidTeamPilgrimCmdSet" id="cmdTeamPilgrimPendingChanges" priority="0x0100" type="Button">
        <Parent guid="guidTeamPilgrimCmdSet" id="TeamPilgrimMenuGroup" />
        <Icon guid="guidImages" id="bmpPendingChanges" />
        <Strings>
          <ButtonText>Team Pilgrim Pending Changes</ButtonText>
        </Strings>
      </Button>
    </Buttons>

    <!--The bitmaps section is used to define the bitmaps that are used for the commands.-->
    <Bitmaps>
      <!--  The bitmap id is defined in a way that is a little bit different from the others: 
            the declaration starts with a guid for the bitmap strip, then there is the resource id of the 
            bitmap strip containing the bitmaps and then there are the numeric ids of the elements used 
            inside a button definition. An important aspect of this declaration is that the element id 
            must be the actual index (1-based) of the bitmap inside the bitmap strip. -->
      <Bitmap guid="guidImages" href="Resources\Images.png" usedList="bmpPic1, bmpPendingChanges"/>

    </Bitmaps>
  </Commands>

  <Symbols>
    <!-- This is the package guid. -->
    <GuidSymbol name="guidTeamPilgrimPkg" value="{f56b8666-3ef2-46e5-ac26-8aa0efe1f484}" />

    <!-- This is the guid used to group the menu commands together -->
    <GuidSymbol name="guidTeamPilgrimCmdSet" value="{064ac9aa-5aa9-498a-a5d9-2077be8d9ad6}">

      <IDSymbol name="TeamPilgrimMenuGroup" value="0x1020" />
      <IDSymbol name="cmdTeamPilgrimExplorer" value="0x0100" />
      <IDSymbol name="toolTeamPilgrimExplorer" value="0x0101" />
      <IDSymbol name="cmdTeamPilgrimPendingChanges" value="0x0102" />
      <IDSymbol name="toolTeamPilgrimPendingChanges" value="0x0103" />
    </GuidSymbol>  

    <GuidSymbol name="guidImages" value="{91572e9b-72ad-453b-93df-dfc995721a79}" >
      <IDSymbol name="bmpPic1" value="1" />
      <IDSymbol name="bmpPendingChanges" value="2" />
      <IDSymbol name="bmpPicSearch" value="3" />
      <IDSymbol name="bmpPicX" value="4" />
      <IDSymbol name="bmpPicArrows" value="5" />
      <IDSymbol name="bmpPicStrikethrough" value="6" />
    </GuidSymbol>
  </Symbols>

</CommandTable>

Answer 1

If you get here like me, trying to find why your working extension suddenly (for you) lost all toolbars and menus - then please check that your.vsct file is really processed by VSCT compiler - it should be an VSCTCompile item - something like this

<VSCTCompile Include="MainPackage.vsct">
  <AutoGen>True</AutoGen>
  <DesignTime>True</DesignTime>
  <DependentUpon>MainPackage.tt</DependentUpon>
  <ResourceName>Menus.ctmenu</ResourceName>
  <SubType>Designer</SubType>
</VSCTCompile>  </ItemGroup>

instead of this in my case

<Content Include="MainPackage.vsct">
  <AutoGen>True</AutoGen>
  <DesignTime>True</DesignTime>
  <DependentUpon>MainPackage.tt</DependentUpon>
</Content>

Answer 2

However, the extension SHOULD add two items to the Tools menu - and most of the time, it does not.

1.Since VS2019, it will block any extension from synchronously autoloading. If you get any warning about that, you may need to upgrade the extension to support async background loading. More details refer to this blog .

2.Maybe something wrong with your xx.vsct file, if the structure in it is not valid, the build won't fail and throw error, but you may not see the Item displayed...

Microsoft deprecated one of the libraries that this extension depends on heavily (the Work Item Tracking)

This API is more like TFS API , not VS SDK API , I guess the reason why you can't find the two items is about tip1 or tip2, and the reason why you get an exception when trying to access them is about those APIS are deprecated so I guess you may need to use new REST APIS .

Answer 3

I had a similar problem with an old extension that also uses deprecated API. In the first versions of Visual Studio 2019 it was working properly, but after a VS update, one of the windows stop to work properly and became a "blank window". I spent some months googling a way to solve this problem, and I could fix it by disabling the option in Tools -> Options -> Environment -> General -> "Optimize rendering for screens with different pixel densities"

Answer 4

The following steps seem to restore the Tools menu state on the experimental instance of VS (using 2022):

1. Using 'Regedit' Delete or rename HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\VisualStudio\17.0_7d3fd73aExp (or its equivalent for your version of VS).
2. Reset the experimental instance by running: 'Reset the Visual Studio 2022 Experimental Instance'
3. Re-deploy your VSIX package (or rebuild it through VS while having checked the option "Deploy VSIX content to experimental instance for debugging")

Hopefully this helps!

Answer 5

A quick way to fix the "missing icons":

1. Open VS developer prompt
2. Close all VS instances
3. Run devenv /updateConfiguration