Personally I don't find the HTML navigation bar super useful
– since I tend not to define JavaScript functions inline within the HTML
(instead I use more unobtrusive JavaScript techniques and put my JavaScript
code in separate files), and I usually use code-behind instead of single-file
event handlers for server-side code.
If you are like me and also don't find yourself using that
particular navigation toolbar much, you'll be happy to know that you can turn
it off in VS 2008 and get back about 40-50 pixels that can instead be applied
toward your HTML source code view. To-do this, just select the Tools->Options
menu item within VS, navigate to the "Text Editor->HTML" node and
uncheck the "Navigation Bar" checkbox option:
Once you do this and press the "ok" button, you'll
find that the drop-downs are gone and you have more screen real estate:
(Note: if there is no immediate change after you hit ok, try
closing and then re-opening the HTML/ASP.NET file)
Hope this helps,
Scott
P.S. By default with VS 2010 (starting with Beta2) we are
hiding the navigation bar when in HTML mode with the standard web profile – you
can then turn it back on via Tools->Options if you find it useful. VS
2010 also has a new optional "code optimized" web profile as well that turns
off all toolbars, dropdown and HTML designers.