14 DAY TRIAL // At the end of October 2008, Microsoft served the first taste of the next generation of its developer tools. Moving onward from Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1 and .NET Framework 3.5 SP1, the Redmond company made available for download the pre-release versions of Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0.
Complementing the delivery of the next generation development tools and platform from Microsoft, Brad Abrams, program manager, offered a perspective on the .NET Framework 4.0 universe, aiming to provide an insight into a selection of new types and namespaces associated with the next version of the programming model, via Silverlight DeepZoom and as a PDF.
“We created a very cool poster that shows off the new stuff in .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 and .NET Framework 4.” Abrams stated. “Here is the DeepZoom version! (use your mouse wheel or click and control-click to zoom in and out). Download the .NET Framework 4 Poster PDF for high quality printing.”
As the professional Developers Conference 2008 was focusing on development of the Windows 7 client and server operating system, Microsoft produced a Community Technology Preview (CTP) of Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0, offering a preview of the resources that would be available for the next iteration of the Windows operating system.
According to the Redmond giant, Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 are set up to democratize application lifecycle management, but also to increase flexibility, efficiency, and productivity.
Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 will be tailored to Windows 7, Office, and the web, and, in this regard, will permit developers to built applications for the Windows Azure Cloud operating system. In addition to the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 Community Technology Preview, the company has also been offering presentations, hands-on labs, and demos of the development tools via the Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 Training Kit, up for grabs since November.
The Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 Community Technology Preview (CTP) is available for download here.