How can one use the "Add view" dialog in Visual Studio efficiently when working with ASP.NET MVC?

Question

Does anyone else think that the add view dialog in VS is useless or is it just me?

Why is there no search/filtering in there? I can not even paste the type name (without namespace) there to speed up the view creation.

Plus, there are a lot of irrelevant classes there, including classes from all referenced libraries.

Am I missing something or Microsoft never did any usability testing with that??

Is it possible to filter out types/assemblies in the dialog and/or better navigation compared to manually scrolling the combobox with all the types listed? Is it possible to include only types from a particular directory/assembly/namespace? (the ViewModels namespace for example)

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EDIT: As it seems from the answers that there is no usable workaround for this, I have filed a suggestion at Connect: https://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/ViewFeedback.aspx?FeedbackID=507784

Please vote for the suggestion if you find this is an important issue.

Answer 1

I mainly agree with you. While it's not competely useless, tha fact that all the classes from the referenced libraries show up and that it doesn't have a search box make it slow to add a new view. Maybe you could file a wishlist bug report on the ASP.NET MVC site...

Answer 2

1. There is search/filter, but it's a "starts with" search. Start typing and the list will be filtered.
2. You can paste the type name, but you do need the namespace.
3. No, I don't think you can remove assemblies.

Could it be improved? Sure. Some of your suggestions are good, and you should consider filing Connect reports for them. Is it useless, IMHO, no.

I tried the dialog in VS2010. As of beta 2, it behaves the same as VS2008, AFAICS. So get your suggestions in soon!

Answer 3

As it seems from that there is no usable workaround for this, I have filed a suggestion at Connect.

In case anyone else feels that this dialog should be improved, please vote for the suggestion in Connect.

Answer 4

Resharper 5.0 implements this dialog very efficiently, solving all the described problems.