How to Install Custom Controls to Visual Studio, Part II
This post is about how to install custom controls to Visual Studio.
In part I I mentioned all you need to install your custom WinForms controls to Visual Studio 2008.
I thought it would be challenging to add support for Visual Studio 2010 and 2012. However, I was fortunately wrong.
If you have done the basic integration for .NET 4 AssemblyFoldersEx, then all you need is an updated Toolbox.exe that supports other Visual Studio versions, which is available in
https://github.com/lextm/ActionListWinForms
I have also updated the Inno Setup installer script to reflect the changes (only a few lines) needed.
Now you should be able to start working on your own installer. Good luck.
Sidenote on SharpDevelop
If you are a control vendor that also wants to support SharpDevelop users, you might note that SharpDevelop does not try to locate design time support assemblies following Visual Studio’s approach. Instead, SharpDevelop reads its own bin folder.
Besides, I did not yet find a way to automate changes to SharpDevelop’s tool box.
So in all, it is reasonable to write a good FAQ article specifically for SharpDevelop users to show them how to manually create the tool box items and add the design time support.