VS 2008 Solution Explorer not showing solution

Question

I have tried this a few different ways and it always seems to fail.

1. Create a new Blank Solution (my.solution.name). Then add a new ClassLibrary project (my.project.name) to the solution. This results in the solution explorer only showing my.project.name.

2. Create a new ClassLibrary (my.project.name) which should have my.project.name solution and my.project.name project. I only see my.project.name project.

Without the solution level I'm unable to add any new projects to my solution. This seems to have just started today.

Answer 1

There is a setting in the Visual Studio 2008 options that controls this:

• Open the options dialog Tools > Options...
• Select Projects and Solutions > General in the navigation pane
• Check Always show solution

If this option is enabled, then the solution will always be visible in the Solution Explorer, even if there is only 1 project in the solution.

Answer 2

If you added another project the solution will appear, so if its just one project in the solution you will not see the solution, but if more than one project attached to the same solution you will start seeing the solution.

You can add new project normally from file menu then select add to solution.

And i think this problem solved by SP1.

Update:

While my answer explain why this is happening but I beleive that the correct solution is https://stackoverflow.com/a/4946248/20126 from @bcpettifer

Answer 3

All you need to do is to Reset The windows layout in Windows Menu.