If you’re using the Mac keyboard, you’ll want to change the function key behavior so the F1-F12 keys work correctly in Visual Studio. From System Preferences – Keyboard, make sure Use all F1, F2, etc. Keys as standard function keys is checked.

Saturday, August 6th, 2016

Now we have two Visual Studio versions (Visual Studio for Mac, Visual Studio Code) that can directly install on the Mac (macOS), refer to your description, it looks like you installed the Visual Studio for Mac, it is a developer environment optimized for building mobile and cloud apps with Xamarin and.NET. Does Visual Studio for MacOS have all development and debugging capabilities (especially in C, C++, and C# languages), like which Visual Studio for Windows has? General question - what are capability differences between Professional and Enterprise edition (of Visual Studio)? Visual C++ to Mac using C++Builder By: Sarina DuPont Abstract: Learn how you can take your existing C++ code from other development environments such as Visual Studio and use it in projects and applications that run natively on both Windows and Mac using the FireMonkey application framework. Developer Community for Visual Studio Product family. After version 7.6 All my Xamarin forms project won't reference.NET Portable Subset assemblies, breaking intellisene.

By Michael Suodenjoki, August 2016.

I wanted to play with and test Visual Studio Code's (VSCode) features for doing C++ development on the Mac platform.

At work and in the past 20+ years I've mainly been using Windows, so this is somewhat different and new interesting territory for me. Previously I've used C++ on the Mac at a basic level, but do have *nix experience, e.g. working with GCC compiler, GDB debugger, NetBeans etc.

Nevertheless, this document contain my VSCode experience results, with small how-to guides for getting up and running.

To follow, I do expect that you have a minimal understanding of working with text editors, C++ build/compilation, C++ debugging and terminal shell commands.

Test machine and installed setup:

Mac OS X Yosemite, version 10.10.5
XCode 7.2.1, the official development tool for C++ on Mac OS X is assumed installed.
Xcode Command Line Tools is assumed installed. This will include (Apple's) clang compiler and Standard C/C++ library.
Visual Studio Code (VSCode) 1.4 is assumed installed.
VSCode Extension(s):
- Microsoft's C/C++ v0.8.1
- Yasuaki MITANI's C/C++ Clang v0.2.1
- xaver's Clang-Format v0.10.2

Sample C++ code

Let's take a simple Hello World program:

Create project folder structure

VSCode requires (or works best) when a project is residing in its own main folder. This also makes the VSCode EXPLORER pane work appropriately.

Create a folder e.g. test (use Finder or Terminal)
Start the VSCode application.
Create a new file using File, New or Command(⌘)+N.
Type in the above C++ source code into the new file and save it as a new file, e.g. test.cpp using File, Save As.. or Shift(⇧)+Command(⌘)+S.

To get code completion etc. up and running

To setup include path to point to the Standard C++ headers, I've added a new path /Applications/.. to the includePath setting in the c_cpp_properties.json file in the 'Mac' configuration section.

This is also where you would need to add the include path for/if you use a third-party library, e.g. boost.

Formatting your C++ source code with clang-format

To format C++ source code with clang-format, clang-format must be available (installed).

clang-format can most easily be installed by using the Homebrew package manager. See also http://macappstore.org/clang-format/

Activate Terminal with Command(⌘)+Space, type Terminal and press Enter.
Install Homebrew package manager (skip if already installed) by executing shell command:
Install clang-format using Homebrew by executing command:
Verify by running command:
Should output something like, e.g.:

To format your C++ source code file run Shift(⇧)+Alt(⌥)+F. Alternatively start the VSCode's View, Command PaletteShift(⇧)+Command(⌘)+P and search for and run Format Code command.

Tip. You can place your own .clang-format file specifying your own configuration file for the formatting. For options see Clang Format Style Options

Build (compile) your C++ file

As far as I understand there is, as of this writing (August 5, 2016), no such thing as an integrated build command for clang in VSCode. Perhaps it is possible to establish a task runner for it.

I can see several options - at least:

Compile using clang or g++ on command line, e.g. using bash.
- Example: Stackoverflow: How do I set up VSCode to compile C++ code
Use CMake or alternative cross-platform build (generator) tools. A great advantage with this is that your project becomes a lot more platform independent.

Both of these options can be used with VSCode's integrated terminal.

Since, I could see that VSCode already have CMake extensions available and know that CMake is quite popular nowadays I though this could be interesting to use.

I'm not at all familiar with CMake, except at the most basic level. I understand what it is. I also know that some people believe it to be difficult to work with. Build tools usually are complex - particular in non-trivial, i.e. real development, environments. So this is not surprising.

Installing CMake

To install CMake:

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Open Terminal, e.g. directly from within VSCode using View, Integrated Terminal to open lower terminal pane in VSCode.
Run command brew install cmake to install CMake via Homebrew.
Run command cmake --version to verify version installed. I worked with version 3.6.1.
Also consider to install the VSCode CMake extension, Shift(⇧)+Command(⌘)+X to open the extension view, search for CMake.

Build with CMake

Create a CMakeLists.txt file in the main project folder with the content of:
Note: Above does not specify full debug symbols.
Open Terminal and execute:
to create a new Debug sub-directory. This will eventually also contain a debug version of the executable. Source
Execute command:
This will generate the Makefile which can build debug executable from the test.cpp C++ source file using XCode's C++ compiler (AppleClang).
Execute make to build the debug executable - named TEST.
Output may look something like:
Run the executable with ./TEST. You should see output like:

Debug the program (with LLDB)

You can also debug your executable from within VSCode.

Start VSCode's debug mode using View, Debug or Shift(⇧)+Command(⌘)+D. You'll see that left pane changes to DEBUG and states C++ Launch.
Activate the settings (wheel) icon to open the launch.json file and ensure that the sections referencing 'program' is specifying the main executable file TEST.
Save the launch.json file.
Select your test.cpp file and set a breakpoint in a interesting code line, e.g. line 7 where std::cout << .. is. You set a breakpoint on a line by either by double-clicking at the beginning of the line (left of line number) or placing the cursor at t

How To Use Visual Studio For C++ On Mac