Working with Classes and Other Types (Class Designer)

Class Designer provides a visual designer called a class diagram that you can use to create and edit classes and other types in a project.

Class Designer provides three kinds of functionality:

Design. You can edit a project's code by editing the class diagram. You can add new elements and delete unwanted ones. Your changes are reflected in code.
Visualization. You can view a graphical representation of the types in a project to better understand the project's structure. By customizing this view, you can focus on the details of the project that are most important to you. You can save the image of your project for use in demonstration or documentation.
Refactor classes and types. You can override methods, rename identifiers, refactor parameters, and implement interfaces and abstract classes.

Note

Class Designer does not track the location of your source files, so modifying your project structure or moving source files in the project can cause Class Designer to lose track of the type (especially the source type of a typedef, base classes, or association types). You might receive an error such as Class Designer is unable to display this type. If you do, drag the modified or relocated source code to the class diagram again to redisplay it.

Note

If you have Visual Studio Ultimate, you can also create UML class diagrams. For more information, see UML Class Diagrams: Reference.

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