Refreshing the IntelliSense cache in Azure Data Studio

azure data studio, sql operations studio, intellisense

Checking that the backing table for the Employees entities has been created properly

As with SQL Server Management Studio, Visual Studio and Visual Studio Code (the latter being the product Azure Data Studio is based on) there's support for IntelliSense, which is why in the screengrab above you can see red squiggles under the name of a newly created table.

To fix this, press CTRL-SHIFT-P to bring up the Command Palette (or select it from the top of the View menu), then type in intellisense and select Refresh Intellisense Cache from the listed options - which is the only one at the time of writing:

The Azure Data Studio command palette showing the Refresh IntelliSense Cache option after having used the search term intellisense

After a few seconds of thinking about it, the red squiggles disappear and indeed hovering the mouse cursor over [Employees] gives a tool-tip that confirms that Azure Data Studio has picked up the new object, and what type of object it is:

Azure Data Studio showing that the IntelliSense cache has been updated and is now aware of both the object and its type

There may be an auto-refresh of the cache that happens periodically, but as the Command Palette shows keyboard shortcuts next to search results it doesn't look like this option gets a keyboard shortcut by default.

About Rob

I've been interested in computing since the day my Dad purchased his first business PC (an Amstrad PC 1640 for anyone interested) which introduced me to MS-DOS batch programming and BASIC.

My skillset has matured somewhat since then, which you'll probably see from the posts here. You can read a bit more about me on the about page of the site, or check out some of the other posts on my areas of interest.

11 Comments

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    Thanks

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    Doesn't work with refresh IntelliSense cache(I've waited around 10 minutes). Works only when i disconnect and reconnect to the database server.

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    Hi Alex,

    It looks like something might have changed in Azure Data Studio! I can see the same issue/symptoms that you've spotted, however it looks like the cache refresh is happening, but it isn't being reflected in tabs that are already open. If I open a new tab, the IntelliSense cache appears to have been updated. Hopefully it'll be fixed soon :)

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    Hello Robert,

    Thanks for your response. Indeed it does seem to work if i open a new tab, however if i close the current tab(after saving it) and open it again it does not work. Hope this will be fixed in future updates.

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    Thanks! worked

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    Ctrl+Shift+R Normally does this for SSMS. Having to hit the command pallet for every open tab is crazy. 16 months since the last post....still not fixed.

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    My problem with ADS, the squiggly red lines appear everytime I issue CREATE OR ALTER PROCEDURE statement. It always says "Alter procedure must be the only statement in the batch" when hovering over the allegedly problematic line. The fact that there's nothing wrong with my script but the red lines don't disappear is really annoying.

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    If you click the gear icon next to "Refresh IntelliSense Cache," you can set a keyboard shortcut for the command.

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    When I refresh intellisense cache through the settings gear or through the short keys, nothing happens.

    Please help. I am using Azure data studio version 1.34

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    Hi Scott - I'm afraid it's not something I can give you a steer with as the refresh option *should* work. If you can get a reproducible scenario (and perhaps even if you can't) it might be worth raising it in their GitHub repo issues @ https://github.com/Microsoft/azuredatastudio

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    Use Redgate SQL Prompt, which is much better, is free and is recommended by azure data studio

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