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Okay, the lack of color on VS2012 is gross.

Is there someplace I can get a theme pack or something for it so that it actually looks reasonable? I really liked the look of VS2010. However, the new one reminds me way too much of 1984.

While we are at it, is there anyway to have it stop shouting at me? ALL CAPS menus are pretty hard to read. [ note: caps was resolved, thanks Konamiman]

NotMe
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8 Answers8

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Yes, luckily you can revert the Visual Studio 2012 ALL CAPS menus to normal menus by hacking the registry:

  1. Launch regedit and navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\General
  2. Create a DWORD value named SuppressUppercaseConversion with value 1.

NOTE: As explained in the answer pointed by Yahoo Serious, the VisualStudio part on the registry key name should be changed to VSWinExpress for Visual Studio Express, and to VWDExpress for Visual Studio Express for Web.

UPDATE:

I have applied this hack in another machine and at first it did not work. It turned out that I had selected the key name from this response by double clicking it, then copied it, then pasted it in regedit. Well, by doing so I had inadvertently created the key with a trailing space in the name! And hence it did not work.

So, if you apply this hack and it seems to not work, ensure that there are no trailing spaces in the key name.

Konamiman
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    YES, THAT IS SO AWESOME BECAUSE NOT EVERYONE ENJOYS READING TEXT LIKE THIS ALL DAY LONG! – rmiesen Oct 15 '12 at 05:15
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    I wish I could just continuously like this post until my menus went back to lower. Seriously though, thanks. – Phillip Schmidt Nov 06 '12 at 17:15
  • Edited key (double checked location, type and value), closed all instances of VS, and restarted. Doesn't work, at least not for me (RTM version Windows 8 x64). Maybe one needs to restart windows (logoff and logon didn't help). – Stefan Steiger Dec 25 '12 at 11:02
  • Windows 8 Pro x64, Visual Studio 2012 Update 1, and it works perfectly (tested on three different machines). And it is not necessary to restart Windows, restarting VS is enough. – Konamiman Jan 10 '13 at 10:26
  • Worked nicely on Windows 7 Home Premium, Visual Studio 2012 Ultimate :) Cheers – ains Feb 19 '13 at 12:41
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    Just to help those with Express and other VS-versions, check [this StackOverflow-post](http://stackoverflow.com/a/10859562). – Yahoo Serious Mar 01 '13 at 09:11
  • For VS2013, create the key under: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\12.0\General – Andrew Theken Jan 17 '14 at 12:38
105

New Theme editor Specifically for 2012:

http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/366ad100-0003-4c9a-81a8-337d4e7ace05

Comes w/ VS 2010 style blue and a few others...

bbqchickenrobot
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    +1 This. Super easy to plugin (just a VS extension), comes with a number of pre-packaged themes with one closely matching 2010. But one of the best features I like is the simple switching from the toolbar - which allows me to have multiple VS2012s open and quickly change the color of each window (with 3 monitors and 5 VS2012s open, it can be a pain to track which is which). Changing colors is just 2 mouse clicks (wished extensions supported keyboard shortcuts). – eduncan911 Sep 19 '12 at 14:40
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    I previously migrated back to VS2012 as 2012 made my eyes hurt after a few minutes of usage - this addin finally allows me to use VS2012 (and the improved STL implementation)! – MFH Oct 18 '12 at 11:11
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    Looks like this does not support the Express versions. Is there an alternative that does? – Richard Ev Dec 02 '12 at 11:58
  • Not that I know of Richard :( – bbqchickenrobot Jun 12 '13 at 18:00
  • As mentioned by ElYusubov below, this is more easily done via NuGet. – David Yates Jun 14 '13 at 15:11
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Here is a shot of my VS2012 install that almost looks like the familiar 2010 we are all used to. It makes me feel normal again!

enter image description here

Here is exactly how I did this, step-by-step:

1) Close all instances of Visual Studio

2) Download vsip and extract it to a temp directory. (as of 1/3/2013 the current version is 1.5.2)

3) Open up a command prompt with "Run as administrator"

4) Go to the temp directory and run VSIP.exe - This will run an interactive program that accepts commands.
  4a) Type "backup --version=2012" - This will backup all of your VS2012 UI dlls, just in case something gets messed up and you want to uninstall VSIP.
  4b) Type "extract" - This will extract all of the old icons from your installation of VS2010 (per VS2010 license VSIP can not distribute those icons so we have to have a local install to pull them from).
  4c) Type "inject" - This will inject all of the old 2010 icons from the previous step into the VS2012 DLLs.
  4d) Type "menus -n" - This will change the menus so they are NOT ALL CAPITALIZED!

5) Download and install NiceVS - do not download the one dated 10/14 or you will be missing icons. As of 1/3/2013 I downloaded the file named "NiceVS.0.8.1.1 Beta.Full.vsix".

6) Download and install VS2012 Color Theme Editor - The next time you start VS2012 select the "Blue" theme from the color select window.

Now you should have a nice install of VS2012 that looks like my screen shot above! It takes three different applications to patch that hideous UI but it's certainly workable now! If you don't have VS2010 installed on the same machine as VS2012 then you will have to run 4b on a machine with VS2010 and then copy the VSIP Images directory to your 2012 development machine.

Update: If you install "VS 2012 Update 1" after running these steps you will need to re-run step 4c from the VSIP admin prompt (or all of step 4 if you didn't keep the extract of the VS2010 images). The file menu icons and color scheme stay as they are but the update reverts the icons in the solution explorer back to the ugly ones. Re-running the VSIP inject fixes it right up!

EverPresent
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  • Hello, I have VS2012 + Update 1 installed. Then I followed Step 4 and install NiceVS. But in Solution Explorer, I still have 2012 style of icons. Do I miss something? – user565739 Jan 12 '13 at 15:16
  • You might try deleting the following temp folder: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0 [See this article](http://blog.hackingonhacks.com/2012/09/10/how-to-clear-the-visual-studio-image-cache/) for a better explanation. Also, take a look at the Limitations section [here](http://vsip.codeplex.com/wikipage?title=Version%201.5&referringTitle=Documentation). It mentions a few problems with the Class View icons. – EverPresent Jan 13 '13 at 01:19
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    Seems it doesnt work if installed version of VS2010 is express edition. I got this error message from VSIP.exe : "Unable to find an installed edition of Visual Studio 2010". VS2012 version installed on my machine is professional version. – tigrou Jan 31 '13 at 10:38
  • Man you are a God. Thank you very much for this. My eyes were suffering from the vs2012 them. +1 – Igor Meszaros Feb 22 '13 at 12:49
  • Unfortunately VSIP does not patch C++ project icons. – untitled8468927 Apr 18 '13 at 10:17
  • Have you come across anything that fixes the icons in the SQL Server Object Explorer and the Toolbox? I'm running update 3 with the Blue theme, I've used Konamiman's registry hack to get rid of the SHOUTY menu titles, and VSIP and NiceVS to change the icons in Solution Explorer and the tool bars. Now just need to fix the SQL Server Object Explorer and the Toolbox. – Simon Elms Jul 31 '13 at 22:53
  • The VS2012 Color Theme Editor by itself is insufficient. This is the best and real answer. (Yes it's true, I have generous managers who gave me an early 2015 Xmas by providing me an upgrade from VS2008 to VS2012). – cartland Dec 16 '14 at 07:19
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I feel your pain, and have been checking daily for a solution. I've now discovered this site, which includes a theme editor, as well as drumroll a VS2010 theme for VS2012!

http://bchavez.bitarmory.com/archive/2012/08/27/modify-visual-studio-2012-dark-and-light-themes.aspx

Edit - I just noticed that Brian Chavez already posted the same link as me. However, I don't think it included a premade 2010 theme until today.

Edit 2 - Another theme editor - http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/366ad100-0003-4c9a-81a8-337d4e7ace05 AND ICONS!!! - http://vsip.codeplex.com/

Paul McLean
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6

http://studiostyl.es/

The themes for 2010 work for 2012 as well

linkerro
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    Good resource, but unfortunately these are themes for the code editors, not for the Visual Studio shell itself. – Konamiman Aug 16 '12 at 11:17
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This extension was just released a couple of days ago: Visual Studio 2012 Color Theme Editor

John Maillet
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If you want to change the VS shell environment themes in Visual Studio 2012, try this utility:

Modify Visual Studio 2012 Dark (and Light) Themes

Source Code

Brian Chavez
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  • Looks good, but a bit complicated. Anyway you could give it the ability to save themes to a website and allow people to share them? – NotMe Sep 06 '12 at 20:09
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The quick option to look is VSColorOutput extension for VS2012. Just look at Tools->Extensions and NUGet package will help you to locate it asap.

Another option would be downloading and Visual Studio Color Schemes. http://studiostyles.info/ . Here is a link to Scott Gu's blog which describes how to apply your preferred schema.

Yusubov
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