title: Adding a guideline to the editor in Visual Studio
body: <p><strong>Introduction</strong></p>
  <p>I've always been searching for a way to make Visual Studio draw a line after a certain amount of characters.</p>
  <p>Below is a guide to enable these so called <em>guidelines</em> for various versions of Visual Studio.</p>
  <p><strong>Visual Studio 2013 or later</strong></p>
  <p>Install Paul Harrington's <a href="http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/da227a0b-0e31-4a11-8f6b-3a149cf2e459/view/Reviews" rel="noreferrer">Editor Guidelines extension</a>.</p>
  <p><strong>Visual Studio 2010 and 2012</strong></p>
  <ol>
  <li>Install Paul Harrington's Editor Guidelines extension for <a href="http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/0fbf2878-e678-4577-9fdb-9030389b338c" rel="noreferrer">VS 2010</a> or <a href="http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/da227a0b-0e31-4a11-8f6b-3a149cf2e459?SRC=Home" rel="noreferrer">VS 2012</a>.</li>
  <li>Open the registry at:
  <br />VS 2010: <code>HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\10.0\Text Editor</code>
  <br />VS 2012: <code>HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\11.0\Text Editor</code>
  <br />and add a new string called <code>Guides</code> with the value <code>RGB(100,100,100), 80</code>. The
  first part specifies the color, while the other one (<code>80</code>) is the column the line will be displayed.</li>
  <li>Or install the <a href="http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/7f2a6727-2993-4c1d-8f58-ae24df14ea91" rel="noreferrer">Guidelines UI</a> extension (which is also a part of the <a href="http://visualstudiogallery.msdn.microsoft.com/d0d33361-18e2-46c0-8ff2-4adea1e34fef/" rel="noreferrer">Productivity Power Tools</a>), which will add entries to the editor's context menu for adding/removing the entries without needing to edit the registry directly. The current disadvantage of this method is that you can't specify the column directly.</li>
  </ol>
  <p><strong>Visual Studio 2008 and Other Versions</strong></p>
  <p>If you are using Visual Studio 2008 open the registry at <code>HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0\Text Editor</code> and add a new string called <code>Guides</code> with the value <code>RGB(100,100,100), 80</code>. The first part specifies the color, while the other one (<code>80</code>) is the column the line will be displayed. The vertical line will appear, when you restart Visual Studio.</p>
  <p>This trick also works for various other version of Visual Studio, as long as you use the correct path:</p>
  <pre><code>2003: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\7.1\Text Editor
  2005: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\8.0\Text Editor
  2008: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VisualStudio\9.0\Text Editor
  2008 Express: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\VCExpress\9.0\Text Editor
  </code></pre>
  <p><a href="https://stackoverflow.com/a/332577/11387">This also works in SQL Server 2005 and probably other versions.</a></p>