Datasheet

Book VII
Chapter 1
Working with the
Visual C++ 2008 IDE
and Projects
721
Writing Code Faster
Figure 1-4:
Running the
application
displays
a simple
message.
Writing Code Faster
Microsoft provides a number of ways to obtain help in writing code faster.
The two most commonly used techniques are working with the help files and
relying on IntelliSense. The following sections describe how to use these two
approaches.
Obtaining coding help
You have access to a wealth of help options. The first place most people
look is the Help menu. The Help menu does contain a wealth of options, but
the help you receive is generic. These options may open a copy of MSDN
Library, but you still have to look for the topic you need help with and most
developers want something faster.
Another approach is to double-click the keyword you need to understand
better and press F1. Using this technique opens a copy of MSDN Library,
but this time you see the help associated with the keyword. Unfortunately,
you get the help that Microsoft thinks you need. MSDN Library can contain
a host of entries for any given keyword. If you don’t see what you want, you
can always type the keyword in the Index tab or perform a search.
Visual Studio also has a feature called Dynamic Help. This window displays
help based on whatever you’re typing at the time. For example, Figure 1-5
shows what you see when you type cout. The advantage of using Dynamic
Help is that you normally see multiple useful help selections, so you can
click the one that looks like it will answer your question. Unfortunately,
Dynamic Help can also cause problems by eating system resources and
causing the IDE to work slowly. You display Dynamic Help by choosing
Help➪Dynamic Help. Simply close the window when you no longer need it.
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