Text highlighting in WinDbg Preview

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Hi Everyone!

There’s a new update rolling out to WinDbg Preview (version 1.1801.19001.0) with some minor bug fixes and one highly requested feature! We know that sharing the output of your debugger is pretty important for passing along bugs and investigations. Often people spend a big chunk of time forming mails by highlighting important output, addresses, and values. You can now easily highlight all instances of selected text directly in the debugger!

To use it, just select some text in the command window and then click “Highlight” in the command ribbon or hit Ctrl+Alt+H. Using one of those on already highlighted text will remove the highlighting.

If you prefer using commands, you can use the “$hl” command:

  • $hl ["someValueHere"] - Highlight give text (or un-highlight if already highlighted)
  • $hl clearAll – Clear all highlighted entries
  • $hl caseSensitive [1|0] - Set highlight matching to case sensitive or case insensitive (default is case insensitive)

Let us know what you think in the comments below, or in the Feedback Hub!

-Andy