Friday, June 7, 2013

SSMS 2012 - Lines with Background Color Have Ugly Gaps

I've been using SQL Server Management Studio 2012 for about 10 minutes now, so I don't have much to say about it yet. I'm sure it's a big improvement over previous versions, and I'm looking forward to exploring.

So what's the problem? It's trivial, really, but at the same time, just so glaringly ugly. I set my T-SQL comments to have a background color. For me, it's easier to "filter out" the non-executing part of the code that way. It also makes it possible to "section off" my code for clarity; splitting a long script into chunks makes it much more digestable. Here's an example using SSMS 2008:


See how the comments form one cohesive block of color? Smarter people than me could tell you why this is psycho-visually important. I just know that it is important. So imagine my dismay when I opened my first SQL file in SSMS 2012 and saw this (click on the image to get the full-size version):


Each comment line is now separated by a thin stripe of background color, in my case black. (And yes, it looks the same with a white background.) Who at Microsoft thought this monstrosity was acceptable? The only Connect I could find on it is at http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/details/645507/syntax-highligher-issues and it's been marked as "Closed Won't Fix," which is the kind of response that reminds me why I'm not a full-time a C/C++/C# developer anymore.

I know, it's a little thing, but a closer look at these lines reveals that someone put some work into creating this gap: it wasn't just accidental. Look closely at the line above the black gap in the zoomed-in image below:


You can see that the color of the line above the gap is blended with the background color, which, I suppose, gives it a more appealing look (assuming that you like the background lines in the first place). This touch is obviously someone's handiwork, which probably explains why they're not interested in fixing it. I guess now I just need to either live it with, stop coloring comments differently, or find a workaround somewhere.

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