Microsoft Visual Studio

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Microsoft Visual Studio
A typical Hello world! program in Visual C++ 2005.
Maintainer:	Microsoft
Stable release:	2005 Service Pack 1 (8.0.50727.762) (December 13, 2006) [+/-]
Preview release:	"Orcas" March 2007 CTP[9] [+/-]
OS:	Microsoft Windows
Use:	Integrated development environment
License:	Microsoft EULA
Website:	msdn.microsoft.com/vstudio

Microsoft Visual Studio is Microsoft's flagship software development product for computer programmers. It centers on an integrated development environment which lets programmers create standalone applications, web sites, web applications, and web services that run on any platforms supported by Microsoft's .NET Framework (for all versions after 6). Supported platforms include Microsoft Windows servers and workstations, PocketPC, Smartphones, and World Wide Web browsers.

Visual Studio includes the following:

• Visual Basic
• Visual C++
• Visual C#
• Visual J#

• Visual Web Developer

Some versions include a developer edition of Microsoft SQL Server.

In the past, the following products were included:

• Visual InterDev, a web page development application used for modifying Active Server Pages as well as HTML and other web scripting files.
• Visual J++, a Java development tool.
• Visual FoxPro, an xBase programming language now allied to but independent from the Visual Studio platform.

Contents 1 History 1.1 Visual Studio 97 1.2 Visual Studio 6.0 1.3 Visual Studio .NET (2002) 1.4 Visual Studio .NET 2003 1.5 Visual Studio 2005 2 Visual Studio Tools for Applications 3 Future development 4 Extensibility 5 Deployment 6 See also 7 References 8 External links

[edit] History

[edit] Visual Studio 97

Microsoft first released Visual Studio in 1997, bundling together many of its programming tools for the first time. Visual Studio 97 was released in two editions, Professional and Enterprise. It included Visual Basic 5.0 and Visual C++ 5.0, primarily for Windows programming; Visual J++ 1.1 for Java and Windows programming; and Visual FoxPro 5.0 for xBase programming. It introduced Visual InterDev for creating dynamically generated web sites using Active Server Pages. A snapshot of the Microsoft Developer Network library was also included.

Visual Studio 97 was Microsoft's first attempt at using the same development environment for multiple languages. Visual C++, Visual J++, InterDev, and the MSDN Library all used one environment, called Developer Studio. Visual Basic and Visual FoxPro used separate environments.

[edit] Visual Studio 6.0

The next version, version 6.0, was released in 1998. The version numbers of all of its constituent parts also moved to 6.0, including Visual J++ which jumped from 1.1, and Visual InterDev which was at 1.0. This version was the basis of Microsoft's development system for the next four years, as Microsoft transitioned their development focus to the .NET Framework.

Visual Studio 6.0 was the last version to include Visual Basic as most of its programmers knew it; subsequent versions would include a quite different version of the language based on .NET. It was also the last version to include Visual J++, which included deeper ties to Windows and proprietary extensions to the Java language that were incompatible with Sun's version. This caused Sun to sue Microsoft. As part of the settlement, Microsoft would no longer sell programming tools that targeted the Java Virtual Machine.

Although Microsoft's long-term goal was to unify its tools under one environment, this version actually had one more environment than VS 97. Visual J++ and Visual InterDev broke away from the Visual C++ environment, while Visual Basic and Visual FoxPro maintained their separate tools.

[edit] Visual Studio .NET (2002)

The biggest change was the introduction of a managed code development environment using the .NET Framework. Programs developed using .NET are not compiled to machine language (like C++ is, for example) but instead to a format called Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL) or Common Intermediate Language (CIL). When an MSIL application is executed, it is compiled while being executed into the appropriate machine language for the platform it is being executed on, thereby making code portable across several platforms. Programs compiled into MSIL can be executed only on platforms which have an implementation of Common Language Infrastructure. It is possible to run MSIL programs in Linux or Mac OS X using non-Microsoft .NET implementations like Mono and DotGNU.

Microsoft introduced C# (C-sharp), a new programming language, that targets .NET. It also introduced the successor to Visual J++ called Visual J#. Visual J# programs use Java's language syntax. However, unlike Visual J++ programs, Visual J# programs can only target the .NET Framework, not the Java Virtual Machine that all other Java tools target.

Visual Basic was drastically changed to fit the new framework, and the new version was called Visual Basic .NET. Microsoft also added extensions to C++, called Managed Extensions for C++, so that C++ programmers could create .NET programs.

Visual Studio .NET can be used to make applications targeting Windows (using Windows Forms, part of the .NET Framework), Web (using ASP.NET and Web Services) and, with an add-in, portable devices (using the .NET Compact Framework).

The Visual Studio .NET environment was rewritten to partially use .NET. All languages are unified under one environment, except for Visual FoxPro. Compared to previous versions of Visual Studio, it has a cleaner interface and greater cohesiveness. It is also more customizable with tool windows that automatically hide when not in use.

Also in this version, Visual FoxPro was no longer being bundled and is now sold separately.

The internal version number of Visual Studio .NET is version 7.0.

[edit] Visual Studio .NET 2003

Microsoft released Visual Studio .NET in 2002 (the beta version was released on the Microsoft developer network in 2001). Microsoft introduced a minor upgrade to Visual Studio .NET in 2003 called Visual Studio .NET 2003. At that point, it referred to the previous version as Visual Studio .NET 2002. It included an upgrade to the .NET Framework, version 1.1. It also came with built-in support for developing programs for mobile devices, using either ASP.NET or the .NET Compact Framework. As well, the Visual C++ compiler was improved to be more standards-compliant, especially in the area of partial template specialization. Visual C++ Toolkit 2003, a free version of the same C++ compiler shipped with Visual Studio .NET 2003 without the IDE, though it is no longer available and now superseded by the Express Editions.

Visual Studio 2003 shipped in four editions: Academic, Professional, Enterprise Developer, and Enterprise Architect. The Enterprise Architect edition included an implementation of Microsoft Visio's modeling technologies, which focused on creating Unified Modeling Language-based visual representations of an application's architecture. "Enterprise Templates" were also introduced, to help larger development teams standardize coding styles and enforce policies around component usage and property settings.

Microsoft released Service Pack 1 for Visual Studio 2003 on September 13, 2006.

The internal version number of Visual Studio .NET 2003 is version 7.1 while the file format version is 8.0.^[1]

[edit] Visual Studio 2005

Visual Studio 2005, codenamed Whidbey (a reference to Whidbey Island in Puget Sound), was released online in October 2005 and hit the stores a couple of weeks later. Microsoft removed the ".NET" moniker from Visual Studio 2005 (as well as every other product with .NET in its name), but it still primarily targets the .NET Framework, which was upgraded to version 2.0. Visual Studio 2005's internal version number is 8.0 while the file format version is 9.0.^[2]

The most important language feature added in this version was the introduction of generics, which are similar in many respects to C++ templates. This potentially increases the number of bugs caught at compile-time instead of run-time by encouraging the use of strict type checking in areas where it was not possible before. C++ also got a similar upgrade with the addition of C++/CLI which is slated to replace the use of Managed C++.^[3]

Other new features of Visual Studio 2005 include the "Deployment Designer" which allows application designs to be validated before deployments, an improved environment for web publishing when combined with ASP.NET 2.0 and load testing to see application performance under various sorts of user loads.

Visual Studio 2005 also added extensive 64-bit support. While the development environment itself is only available as a 32-bit application, Visual C++ 2005 supports compiling for x64 (AMD64 and EM64T) as well as IA-64 (Itanium).^[4] The Platform SDK included 64-bit compilers and 64-bit versions of the libraries.

Visual Studio 2005 is available in several editions, which are significantly different from previous versions: Express, Standard, Professional, Tools for Office, and a set of five Visual Studio Team System Editions. The latter are provided in conjunction with MSDN Premium subscriptions, covering four major roles of software development: Architects, Software Developers, Testers, and Database Professionals. The combined functionality of the four Team System Editions is provided in a Team Suite Edition.

Tools for the Microsoft Office System lets developers create extensions to Microsoft Office.

Express Editions were introduced for amateurs, hobbyists, and small businesses, and are available as a free download from Microsoft's web site. There are Express Editions for each language (Visual Basic, Visual C++, Visual C#, Visual J#), each targeting the .NET Framework on Windows, as well as a Visual Web Developer for creating ASP.NET web sites. The Express Editions lack many of the more advanced development tools and extensibility of the other editions such as Just-in-time JScript debugging.^[5]

Microsoft released service Pack 1 for Visual Studio 2005 on 14 December 2006.^[6]

[edit] Visual Studio Tools for Applications

As a replacement for Visual Basic for Applications, on 27 March of 2007 Microsoft has introduced an edition of Visual Studio 2005 called Visual Studio Tools for Applications (VSTA). Built on Visual Studio and the .NET Framework, VSTA enables innovative customization scenarios while offering new levels of security and control.

[edit] Future development

This article or section contains information about computer software currently in development. The content may change as the software development progresses.

The successor to Visual Studio 2005, code-named Orcas, is currently under development. The name Orcas is, like Whidbey, a reference to an island in Puget Sound, Orcas Island. The successor to Orcas is code-named Hawaii.

Orcas is focused on development of Windows Vista applications. Among other things, it brings a new language feature, LINQ, new versions of C# and Visual Basic languages, a Windows Presentation Foundation visual designer, and improvements to the .NET Framework. It will also likely feature a new HTML/CSS editor influenced by Microsoft Expression Web.^[7] J# will not be included.^[8]

The latest beta is the March 2007 CTP, and the first public available beta is the September 2006 CTP, released on September 28, 2006. Orcas is Vista compatible.

[edit] Extensibility

Visual Studio has a facility for developers to write extensions for Visual Studio to extend its capabilities. These extensions "plug into" Visual Studio and offer benefits beyond what Visual Studio itself offers.

Extensions come in the form of macros, add-ins, and packages. Macros represent repeatable tasks and actions that developers can record programmatically for saving, replaying, and distributing. Add-ins provide access to the underlying routines that drive the Visual Studio IDE to automate tasks like build and deployment. Packages are created using the freely available Visual Studio SDK and enable deep integration for designers, compilers, and programming languages.

Extensions can be developed in the Standard (and higher) versions of Visual Studio 2005. Express Editions do not support hosting extensions.

[edit] Deployment

The ways to deploy Visual Studio/Windows applications:

1. XCOPY deployment - The executable and other files simply need to be copied to the target machine.
2. ClickOnce
3. Deployment using Visual Studio .NET Installer
4. WiX - Windows Installer XML. An Open-Source MSI compiler from Microsoft.

[edit] See also

• Microsoft Visual Studio Express - Free, lightweight version of Visual Studio 2005.
• Visual Studio Team System - A suite of servers and Visual Studio editions for doing team-based software development
• Dynamic-Link Library
• Visual SourceSafe
• List of Microsoft Visual Studio Add-ins

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Microsoft Visual Studio Official Website
• Visual Studio Product Line Feature Comparisons
• Microsoft Visual Studio Team System page
• Microsoft Visual Studio SDK
• Visual Studio 2003 SP1
• Visual Studio 2005 SP1