When writing code in Visual Studio, you may find that you have to pull code samples from StackOverflow or MSDN. You would normally just have to copy and paste the code over and then make some modifications so it fits in with your previously written code. Now Microsoft is making it easier to do through Bing.

The Bing team announced today that it has worked with the Visual Studio and Microsoft Research teams to develop what it calls the Bing Code Search Visual Studio extension. As its name implies, it’s a new extension that uses Bing to find “relevant code samples in Visual Studio providing you with the ability to review and add that code in the code editor.” The Bing team notes that searches are context sensitive so you’ll get samples that use the same variable names in your own code.

Bing says Code Search pulls from MSDN, StackOverflow, Donnetperls and CSharp411. Here’s how it works:

Bing uses signals and metadata including project type and semantic context (e.g. C#/VB compiler) combined with our vast index to deliver relevant code samples directly into the Visual Studio experience. In a few short clicks, you have a set of code snippets for review and copy into the Visual Studio editor without missing a beat.

If you want to see Bing Code Search in action, you can watch a video of it being used here. Unfortunately, there’s no embed just yet, but I’ll update this story with one if Microsoft Research ever bothers to upload it to YouTube.

If you feel your life would be greatly improved through the use of Bing Code Search, you can download the extension here.

Image via Visual Studio Blog