devenv: Visual Studio 2010 and 2008

Having Windows XP 64bit in my office,  after installing the brand new Microsoft Visual Studio 2010, I still had to use the older 2008 version for project purposes. Something that affected my routine is that the command I type in the “Run” after a “Windows Key + R” now have a different meaning. As the executables of both VS 10.0 and 9.0 are same (devenv.exe), now the command “devenv” will open up Visual Studio 2010. For Visual Studio 2008 I have to go through start menu or move the mouse cursor for a desktop or a quick launch shortcut. That’s slow! If I had Vista or Windows 7, There won’t be much problem as there is an instant search in the start menu itself. But why should I change my habit?

After some googling I found out the registry key that should be set inorder to change it. It is:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Paths

for 32 bit OS and for 64 bit use the following path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Paths

where we can find a key named devenv.exe which has the path of VS 10.0 IDE executable. If we change it back to the path of Visual Studio 9.0, we will get it on the same command. But what if we want both as two different commands? Simple. Add another key and give the desired command as the key name.

Well, you can do all these stuff automatically by using my application. It is compatible with Windows XP (64 bit only), Windows Vista and Windows 7 (both 64 bit and 32 bit) having 32 bit version of Visual Studio 9.0 and Visual Studio 10.0. It automatically detects the Visual studio installations and allows you to set desired commands.

Update: Just found out that the application is not supported in Windows XP 32 bit! The reason is that the function “RegDeleteKeyEx” used in the application have a minimum requirement of Windows Vista or Windows XP Professional x64 Edition.

Download: MultiVS.rar