How do I write to the Visual Studio Output Window in My Custom Tool?

Question

I am writing a custom tool and I currently have it doing what I want as far as functionality. I would like to be able to write to Visual Studio if something goes wrong. (In

Answer 1

There is another way using Marshal.GetActiveObject to grab a running DTE2 instance.

First reference EnvDTE and envdte80. This currently works in VisualStudio 2012, I haven't tried the others yet.

using System;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using EnvDTE;
using EnvDTE80;

internal class VsOutputLogger
{
    private static Lazy> _Logger = new Lazy>( () => GetWindow().OutputString );

    private static Action Logger
    {
        get { return _Logger.Value; }
    }

    public static void SetLogger( Action logger )
    {
        _Logger = new Lazy>( () => logger );
    }

    public static void Write( string format, params object[] args)
    {
        var message = string.Format( format, args );
        Write( message );
    }

    public static void Write( string message )
    {
        Logger( message + Environment.NewLine );
    }

    private static OutputWindowPane GetWindow()
    {
        var dte = (DTE2) Marshal.GetActiveObject( "VisualStudio.DTE" );
        return dte.ToolWindows.OutputWindow.ActivePane;
    }
}