Visual Studio Solution Renamer

Allows to rename a solution, its projects and namespaces.
Please note Preview mode is supported and enabled by default.

Get started

The tool is intended to be used as a global dotnet tool.

dotnet tool install -g vsrenamer

Then you can run it directly from the command line:

vsrenamer.exe -w <solution directory> [other parameters]

Examples:

vsrenamer.exe --help
vsrenamer.exe -a -f Old -t New -c -w .\src --rename false --replacecontent true
vsrenamer.exe -a -f Old -t New -c -w .\src --rename true  --replacecontent false
vsrenamer.exe --workingdirectory c:\Sources\projectA\src\ --apply --from projectA --to projectAAA --solution MySolution.sln
vsrenamer.exe -w c:\Sources\projectA\src\ --apply --cleanup
vsrenamer.exe -w c:\Sources\projectB\src\ -a -f projectB -t projectBBB -c --projects --mask "*.csproj *.cs *.xaml"
vsrenamer.exe -w c:\Sources\projectC\src\ -a -f projectC -t projectCCC -c --verbose

If you need to update a solution with ".." paths you can use the following command line:

vsrenamer.exe -w c:\Sources\projectD\src\ -a -f projectD -t projectDDD -c -m "*.sln *.csproj *.xaml *.cs *.xml" -p

Also you can install and run its GUI version

dotnet tool install -g vsrenamer_gui
vsrenamer_gui.exe

Screenshots...

Under the hood

Here is the list of actions to be done during the process of renaming

• Rename .sln file
• Rename .csproj files
• Rename parent folder of the projects
• Update their relative paths in the .sln file
• Set proper AssemblyName and RootNamespace in the .csproj files
• Replace text in files. By default, *.cs *.xaml *.xml *.json *.asax *.cshtml *.config *.js

Limitations

• A single solution file only (.sln)
• A single project (.csproj) per folder
• C# projects only
• No source version control history support

Be aware

• 🔴 No backup feature
• 🔴 No roll-back feature
• 🔴 No proper symlinks support
• 🔴 Tested with
  • Microsoft Visual Studio Solution File, Format Version 12.00
  • Visual Studio Version 16 (2019)
• 🔴 It's strongly recommended to perform renaming with the following two steps:
  1. Replace file content, review the changes and commit (svn, git, etc.)
  2. Rename files and folders

References

• Serilog library
  • Apache 2.0 License
• Command Line Parser Library for CLR and NetStandard
  • MIT License
• Microsoft.Build library
  • MIT License