One of the many changes in the upgrade to Visual Studio 2008 is how Ctrl+Tab switches between open documents in the IDE. Ctrl+Tab used to show the previously viewed document. But in VS 2008, the IDE Navigator window appears as shown below, and you must press Enter to show the previous document. An additional Enter key doesn’t sound like a big inconvenience, but if you do this hundreds of times each day like most developers, you will quickly find the extra step irritating. This article describes how to disable the Ctrl+Tab navigator window in Visual Studio 2008.
What you might not know is that Ctrl+F6 now works the way Ctrl+Tab used to. And since the navigator window can be useful at times, you may want to simply switch the functionality between Ctrl+Tab and Ctrl+F6 as follows:
- In Visual Studio, click the “Tools > Options” menu item.
- Select the “Environment > Keyboard” options.
- Switch the keyboard assignments as follows:
| Macro | Shortcut Key |
| Window.NextDocumentWindow | Ctrl+Tab |
| Window.NextDocumentWindowNav | Ctrl+F6 |
| Window.PreviousDocumentWindow | Ctrl+Shift+Tab |
| Window.PreviousDocumentWindowNav | Ctrl+Shift+F6 |
Another Ctrl+Tab Tip
Here’s something else you may not know. Of course Ctrl+Tab shows the previous document. Press Ctrl+Tab repeatedly and you will cycle between the last two documents you viewed. But if you press and hold the Ctrl key, then press the Tab key multiple times, you will show the documents you previously viewed in the reverse order that you viewed them.
Copyright © 2007-8 Tiwebb Ltd. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without explicit permission from Tiwebb Ltd.
Wasn’t aware of the ctrl-f6 option… awesome
For what it’s worth, you shouldn’t have to press enter with ctrl-tab, just highlight whatever document / form you want and release the keys and it switches… works similar to alt-tab in windows. Holding ctrl down and repeating the tab key will cycle. The only thing I can’t figure out with the ctrl-tab is how to switch between the active files and active tool windows columns without using the arrow keys… that rather sux.
Is there a way to make the tabbing work like every other tab control? I hate the default way. It only works if you only have two tabs open. As soon as you go to three, you never know which tab you’re going to.
Jeff, not that I know of. I like how Ctrl+Tab switches back & forth between two documents, but I agree, I’d prefer if tab navigation worked like Firefox: Ctrl+Tab moves right, Ctrl+Shift+Tab moves left.
Lloyd, on my PC the Navigator window remains open and I have to press Enter or Escape to close it. Perhaps there is another setting that determines how the Navigator window works?
Timm,
Not sure on the setting, I don’t recall anything and spinning through options nothing stood out. I run vs2k8 developer and vs2k8 pro on two different systems and both work similarly. screwy.
Screwy is right! Here was my experience when pressing Ctrl+Tab in Visual Studio:
VS 2003 - no Navigator window
VS 2005 - Navigator window disappears when release Ctrl
VS 2008 - Navigator window does not disappear when release Ctrl; must press Enter or Escape
I had a similar experience, except I know for a fact that at one time my visual studio Ctrp+Tab was not behaving this way. I did however find a link to the solution for my particular issue:
http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=2467648&SiteID=1&mode=1