The Bing Developer Assistant for Visual Studio, currently in beta, combines the functionality of two popular Visual Studio extensions into one: Sample Browser and Bing Code Search. This updated feature enables developers to find and reuse millions of code snippets and code sample projects from within the Visual Studio IDE.
New functionality with Bing Developer Assistant includes new Visual Studio IntelliSense experience to find code samples for API, sample browser one-stop shop, and offline search.
Bing Developer Assistant delivers a major enhancement in Visual Studio IntelliSense. While coding, a relevant code snippet related to a current API will be automatically displayed in the IntelliSense window which is powered by Bing Code Search. Code snippets are short piece of code that developers can easily learn and copy.
Copy the code, or click the source URL to view where the code snippet comes from, or click “Search More” to find more code samples related to the API. In the current release, the new IntelliSense experience is only available to C#, but Microsoft is working to expand the functionality to more programming languages in the future.
The Sample Browser window is now a one-stop shop for code samples. By entering programming needs on the Visual Studio toolbar, developers will get both code snippets and code sample projects. Code sample projects are complete Visual Studio demo solutions that can be downloaded then build and run.
Microsoft has also added offline search. The new plugin enables the ability to search for code samples among local or downloaded sample projects even when disconnected from the Internet. Developers can configure Visual Studio to index local sample folders in Tools/Options. The IntelliSense experience and the Sample Browser main window are still fully functional in the offline situation. What’s even better, it allows the ability to open the Visual Studio sample project that contains the code snippet with one click.
Microsoft says that it has an ambitious roadmap for Bing Developer Assistant for Visual Studio. In addition to plans to support more programming languages in the Visual Studio IntelliSense window, the company is considering expansion of the tool into other Microsoft developer experiences including enterprise code search, compile/debug error assistance, and MSDN forum support.