I have been using Visual Studio since it first came out and have been big fan of it for quite a few years.  Until just recently it had no real competition but with the NetBeans (and Eclipse) getting better every release I cannot say definitively that Visual Studio is the best editor anymore.  Having said that there are still many features that Visual Studio has that I miss every time I use NetBeans. 

1. When doing a search I do not have to copy and paste the search term into the search box: When working with legacy code I often find myself looking for code using text searches.  Often I will follow the uses of a variable with a search only to find the variable assigned to or from another variable.  I then want to follow that variable.  It is real nice not to have to do a copy, go to the search text box, then paste it to now search for the new text.  In Visual Studio I just have to highlight the text and bring up the find, or find and replace.  I find NetBeans very irritating every time I need to do a text search.
2. Right click drag and drop: I find this one of the more useful features in Visual Studio.  In fact I now expect the right click drag and drop functionality to work on every application I use.  This is very useful when I am modifying some code and place a copied piece of code with in it.  I also do not need to think about weather I need to move or copy the selection until I am ready to drop it.  For some reason it does not occur to me what my intent is until I am ready to drop.
3. using the ctrl } or { to go to the matching curly braces:  When working with legacy code, especial bad legacy code, I often need to find where an if or loop statement ends.  this can be a pain if the code within the block is large.  I know this is bad coding practice but when fixing a defect I do not always have the time to refactor the code.  When tracing though a long code statement I often want to skip past an if statement or loop if I know the defect I am hunting is not in that block of code.
4. Auto-complete works for just typing any word: Auto-complete is one of the best IDE features every invented.  NetBeans Does this very well when accessing a property or method of an object, but does not do it when typing a class or variable name.  Visual Studio does this well and has become a time saver, especially for some with a bad short term memory like me.
5. Naming book marks:  This may seem like a small thing but I used it all the time and really miss it in NetBeans.  I often use it to mark definitions or code I want to come back to and look at or code I intent to revisit after I finish my current task.  The trouble I run into then is I also book mark things as a temporary step while coding and I end up with too many book marks to be useful.  In Visual Studio I can name the book marks I want to keep around and quickly go to the correct one and remove the extra book marks easily.

These are just some simple things I notice every day while coding.  There are many other useful features that I use less often in both IDEs.  I just wanted to point out some of the little thing I notice every day that make a big difference.  I feel these improvements in the IDE make me more productive.   I now find myself wondering what little features I can add to my applications to help my users be more productive.

Guest Blogger Esoterica