Microsoft Robotics Studio 1.0 is a Windows based development environment that enables the creation of robotics software across a diversified array of hardware platforms. With Robotics Studio, the Redmond Company aims to deliver a common development platform designed for general implementation in the robotics industry. According to data from Microsoft, the preview releases of the Windows based robotics development environment amounted for a consistent volume of downloads.

"Microsoft Robotics Studio is our response to requests from many hobbyist, academic and commercial robotics developers," said Tandy Trower, general manager of the Microsoft Robotics Group. "We have quickly built a strong community with over 100,000 downloads of our preview releases, and we are excited to see the breadth of partner support across a wide variety of hardware platforms."

Microsoft Robotics Studio allows the development of robotics applications with the following programming languages, Microsoft Visual Studio and Microsoft Visual Studio Express languages (Visual C# and Visual Basic) and Microsoft IronPython. In addition to Microsoft's own programming languages, the Microsoft Robotics Studio also supports third-party languages that are compatible with its architecture.

The Microsoft Robotics Studio is delivered free of charge for deployment into general and academics environments. Commercial robot developers will have to pay $399 for a license of the platform.

"Microsoft will help us extend the reach of the iRobot Roomba Open Interface to a broader community of developers," said Helen Greiner, co-founder and chairwoman of iRobot. "A common development platform like Microsoft Robotics Studio will help ignite the robotics industry and encourage more developers to design new robot applications."

Microsoft Robotics Studio 1.0 was tested by Softpedia as being 100% Clean and is available for download here.