---
title: "Killer IDE macro"
url: "https://osherove.com/blog/2003/2/10/killer-ide-macro.md"
canonical: "https://osherove.com/blog/2003/2/10/killer-ide-macro.html"
published: "2003-02-10T07:55:00"
updated: "2003-02-10T07:55:00"
tags: [".Net Original", "Tips & Tricks"]
author: "Roy Osherove"
description: "I found there is only one(for now) macro that i use in the VS .NET IDE - the one that puts two curly braces in the following lines and puts the cursor in between them. this HAS to be a killer macro. i assigned it the…"
usage: "Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page)."
license: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"
---

# Killer IDE macro

By Roy Osherove February 10, 2003 In [.Net Original](https://osherove.com/blog/category/net-original), [Tips & Tricks](https://osherove.com/blog/category/tips-tricks)

**Historical article** · Originally published February 10, 2003; technical details may be outdated.

I found there is only one(for now) macro that i use in the VS .NET IDE -

the one that puts two curly braces in the following lines and puts the cursor in between them. this HAS to be a killer macro. i assigned it the "CTRL+SHIFT+\[" keys, and my productyvity went up 10 times... here the simpler the pie code:

\-----------------------------------------

Sub NewBraces()

DTE.ActiveDocument.Selection.NewLine()

DTE.ActiveDocument.Selection.Text = "{"

DTE.ActiveDocument.Selection.NewLine()

DTE.ActiveDocument.Selection.Text = "}"

DTE.ActiveDocument.Selection.LineUp()

DTE.ActiveDocument.Selection.NewLine()

DTE.ActiveDocument.Save()

End Sub

\-----------------------------------------

is it possible that there are people who have NOT created this macro on their own? I think the next one will be one that adds the lines:

catch(Exception e)

{

}

to the code.

## More in .Net Original

[All posts in .Net Original](https://osherove.com/blog/category/net-original)

- Feb 22, 2003

    ### [App.Config Magic](https://osherove.com/blog/2003/2/22/appconfig-magic.html)

- Feb 22, 2003

    ### [Cool IDE Shortcut](https://osherove.com/blog/2003/2/22/cool-ide-shortcut.html)


---

## About the author

**Roy Osherove**: Senior Solutions Architect at AWS working on AI for production and AI-driven development; author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership, with about 20 years of consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery.

### Sites

- [RobotPaper](https://robotpaper.ai/): This blog: AI patterns and anti-patterns, AI and coding agents, and engineering leadership.
- [osherove.com](https://osherove.com): Roy's personal site. Author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership; consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery, plus about 20 years of blog posts.
- [The Art of Unit Testing](https://www.artofunittesting.com): The Art of Unit Testing, 3rd Edition (Manning): readable, maintainable, trustworthy unit tests, plus TDD workshops in C#, JavaScript, Java and Kotlin.
- [5whys.com](https://www.5whys.com): Roy's writing on software team leadership: self-organizing teams, surviving chaos, learning mode and the Elastic Leadership model.
- [Pipeline Driven](https://pipelinedriven.org): Continuous delivery and DevOps practices: build patterns, pipeline-friendly testing, DevOps metrics and enterprise DevOps.
- [Elastic Leadership](https://www.elasticleadership.com): Elastic Leadership, Roy's framework for software team leaders (survival, learning and self-organizing modes).

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### Contact

- Contact form: https://forms.gle/jQSx5KoXvrVA1JCK7

### License

Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page). License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/