How to change the font size of the formula bar and measures grid in SSDT for SSAS Tabular

When you create a new measures in SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT) for SSAS Tabular, you edit the formula in the top section of the user interface in a section called “formula bar”. The default font size for this formula bar is 8.

The small font size may be difficult to read for some people. The easiest and fastest way to change the font size is to click somewhere in the formula bar and use your mouse middle wheel while holding down the Control button on your keyboard. However, the font size will go back to the default size next time you open SSDT.

If you wish to change the font size permanently, you can use the Tools menu. Click on Tools –> Options –> Fonts and Colors –> Environment and choose “Business Intelligence Designers” from the drop down menu. Here you can change the font size. Your changes will not take effect until you restart SSDT.

The following pictures show my environment after I changed the formula bar’s font size to 10 and 14.

Font Size 10

Font Size 14

Notice how the font size change affects the table results grid and the measures grid below as well. Also if you right click on any table name tab, the font size for the pop up menu has changed.

Font size 10 was the easiest to work with for me. It made the formula bar easier to read while it kept the rest of the environment at a good manageable size.

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MDX script keyword colors are back in SQL Server Data Tools (SSDT) release version for Visual Studio 2015

The MDX keywords in a cube script were not properly changing colors in the SQL Serve Data Tools (SSDT) Preview version for Visual Studio 2015. (14.0.60316.0). (See my previous post on this problem here.)

The different keyword colors make it easier to write, organize and read an MDX script inside a cube.

The following picture show Adventure Works script inside the latest SSDT.

Here is the version information for the latest version of SSDT available at the time of writing this post.

 

 

MDX keyword colors are missing in SQL Server Data Tools for Visual Studio 2015 Preview

MDX keywords are not changing color in the calculation script in SQL Server Data Tools – preview version for Visual Studio 2015. Hopefully this is a temporary issue and will be fixed in the release version. Having different keyword colors than the rest of the code makes it much easier to read, write and maintain the calculation script especially in larger implementations.

SSDT Preview for VS 2015

The following picture shows how the Adventure Works calculation script looks like when using SSDT Preview for VS 2015 at the time of writing this post. Everything is in black with a grey background.

I am using SQL Server 2016 Release Candidate (RC) 1 and the latest version of  the SSDT which can be found here: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/mt204009.aspx. The latest version of SSDT tested for this post is 14.0.60316.0. Please note that unlike previous versions there seems to be only one single download/install available for SSDT. Previous versions made a distinction between SSDT and SSDT for Business Intelligence (SSDT-BI).  Previously SSDT only supported SQL Server Relational database projects and SSDT – BI supported all business intelligence project types. This does not seem to be the case at least with the preview version.

SSDT – BI for VS 2013

Compare the keyword colors between the above picture and the following picture which shows the calculation script in SSDT – BI for VS 2013:

This script is much easier to read! Fortunately previous versions of SSDT are still available for download from here: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/mt674919.aspx. Since SSDT – BI for VS 2013 seems to work fine with SQL Server 2016 (RC) 1, that’s what I will be using for SSAS development until the keyword colors are fixed in SSDT for VS 2015.

SSDT – BI for VS 2012

A similar problem existed with SSDT – BI in Visual Studio 2012. With SSDT – BI 2012, the script changed the color of comments and all the MDX keywords to green! (See next picture).  As a result most developers opted to use Visual Studio 2008 even against SQL Server 2012 to avoid using the black and grey script. (SSDT – BI was called Business Intelligence Development Studio or BIDS in VS 2008.)

This issue was reported to Microsoft Connect and is currently marked as closed: https://connect.microsoft.com/SQLServer/feedback/details/841790/ssdt-2012-analysis-services-cube-project-calculation-page-color-formatting

I installed SSDT -BI for VS 2012 to see if the problem is fixed as reported by Microsoft Connect. The following shows the Adventure Works calculation script in SSDT -BI  for VS 2012:

It seems like the green MDX keyword colors still exist at least in the version I was able to download.

Versions of SSDT for VS tested for this post

The following pictures show the version information for the different SSDT that I tested for this post. As mentioned previously, there seems to be only one download of SSDT available for VS 2015 that has combined the database project and BI project support.

SSDT for VS 2015

Here you can see the BI version under SQL Server Analysis Services and SQL Server Reporting Services and the relational database project version under SQL Server Data Tools.

The following pictures show the types of project that become available with the download of the latest version of SSDT for VS 2015:

 SSDT – BI for Visual Studio 2013

I have not installed the non-BI SSDT.

 SSDT – BI for Visual Studio 2012

Here I have not installed the non-BI SSDT.