F# PowerPack is now available for download for the latest Beta development milestones of the next generation of Microsoft's development platform and tools. The first Beta builds of Visual Studio 2010 and .Net Framework 4.0 were made available for download to the public in mid-May 2009. Now, developers looking to take advantage of the successors of Visual Studio 2008 and .NET Framework 3.5 to build F# applications can download and use the additional libraries and tools delivered with the F# PowerPack for .NET 4.0 Beta1.

Visual Studio 2010 Beta 1 includes the latest version of F#, as one of the enhancements marking the evolution from version 2008. The “release is a landmark in the process of making F# a language officially supported by Microsoft, being the first release where F# installs as part of Visual Studio 2010. Using Visual Studio 2010 you can build F# applications for .NET 4.0 Beta1, which has been released,” revealed Don Syme, senior researcher at Microsoft Research, Cambridge, when Visual Studio 2010 was released.

But while F# is an integral part of Visual Studio 2010, with the Beta 1 Build, allowing developers to put together applications for .NET 4.0 Beta 1, devs running VS 2008 also have the option of using the language from Microsoft Research. The Redmond company is also offering an updated F# Community Technology Preview designed to integrate with Visual Studio 2008. Obviously the CTP can be used to build applications for .NET 2.0, 3.0 and 3.5.

“F# developed as a research programming language to provide the much sought-after combination of type safety, succinctness, performance, expressivity and scripting, with all the advantages of running on a high-quality, well-supported modern runtime system. This combination has been so successful that the language is now being transitioned towards a fully supported language on the .NET platform,” reads an excerpt from the description of F#.

Microsoft F# PowerPack for .NET 4.0 Beta1 is available for download here.
Microsoft F#, May 2009 Community Technology Preview is available for download here.

Visual Studio 2010 Beta 1 is available for download here.
.NET Framework 4.0 Beta 1 is available for download here.