With Service Pack 1 for Visual Studio 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 out of the way, Microsoft is focusing on what it is referring to as the next generation of development solutions for the Windows platform, the Office system and the Internet. In this context, the Redmond company has made available for download a taste of Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0. The pre-release software comes packaged as a virtual image designed to integrate with Virtual PC 2007 SP1, and contains the Community Technology preview bits of the development tools and platform.

“We released a CTP for Visual Studio 2010 and .NET 4.0. This CTP also includes the Visual Studio Team System "Rosario" features and signals the end of separate "Rosario" CTPs. From here on, Rosario will only be available in the context of VS/VSTS 2010 pre-releases. It's been quite some time since we put out a CTP and so much has changed. The main advice I have for you is to try out the walk-throughs that are included with the CTP. They will give you a terrific overview of the 2010 feature set,” revealed Brian Harry, a Microsoft Distinguished Engineer.

Brian Keller, a Technical Evangelist for Microsoft Visual Studio Team System, indicated that Microsoft is gearing up to make available versions of Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 which would support installation on testing machines. Keller indicated that the Redmond company had yet to perfect the installation experience for the two solutions as the reason for the CTP release as a VPC image.

“This is an exciting release, and is jammed packed with a ton of great new features. One really nice thing about this release is the amount of work that the product teams put into writing walkthroughs which will guide you through most of the new features. I believe this will be our highest-quality Community Technology Preview yet, and we're excited to start getting your feedback on it,” Keller said.

Visual Studio 2010 and .NET Framework 4.0 Community Technology Preview (CTP) is available for download here.