= proggen : a solution generator for Visual Studio 2015/2017/2019

This program generates solutions containing skeleton projects for Visual Studio and is used as an alternative to the new project wizard. It sets up a new solution containing one new project. It then opens visual studio and builds the project - that's where its job ends. A single command can generate many projects (and for each project open an instance of Visual Studio) as long as they are all of the same type.

A new generator class (i.e. one that implements the IGenerator interface) is added for each type of project. For example, there a generator for a C++ console application project, one for a C# WPF project, one for a .Net core project. The GeneratorManager class uses reflection to register all such generators. Adding another generator is simply a matter of defining a class that implements the IGenerator interface - that's all that is required.

Here is an example of a generator class:

[AutoRegister]
class CPP15 : ProgramGenerator
{
    public override string Name => "cpp15|pg15";
    public override string Description => "Generate a C++ Win32 console app for VS 2015 - windows.h included.";
    public override string VSVersion => "2015";
    public override string PlatformToolset => "v140";
    public override Guid ProjectTypeGUID => ProjectTypeGUIDs.cppGuid;
    public override string SolutionConfig => "Win32";
    public override string ProjectSuffix => "vcxproj";
    public override string Command => "OpenConApp";
    public override FileSpec[] FileSpecs => CPPFileSpecs.CPPSpecs;
    public override List<string> Folders => null;
}

The following generators are currently supported:

• cpp15 Generate a solution for Visual Studio 2015 containing a single C++ project.
• cpp17 Generate a solution for Visual Studio 2017 containing a single C++ project.
• wpf17 Generate a solution for Visual Studio 2017 containing a single WPF project.
• cs15 Generate a solution for Visual Studio 2015 containing a single C# console application project.
• cs17 Generate a solution for Visual Studio 2017 containing a single C# console application project.
• cs19 Generate a solution for Visual Studio 2019 containing a single C# console application project.
• corec17 Generate a solution for Visual Studio 2017 containing a single .Net Core console application project.
• webapi Generate a solution for Visual Studio 2017 containing a single Asp.Net Core Web API application project.

== Choosing a version of Visual Studio

The VSVersion property of the ProgramGenerator interface controls which version of Visual Studio is opened.

For Visual Studio 2017 or later, there can be more than one instance or "workflow" installed. For example, there may be an instance of Visual Studio installed for C++ development and a different one for C# development.

Installations of Visual Studio 2017 register themselves on installation and are enumerable via a COM interface. In C# we can use the namespace Microsoft.VisualStudio.Setup.Configuration and