.net Sources are available

Since a few days Microsoft allows access on the .net Framework sources. Visual Studio 2008 was announced with the feature of stepping into the .net source. This is not possible by default so you have to configure your version first. Here you find how to do this. The bad news is: No Express Edition supports stepping into the .net sources - poor for all hobbyists out there.

Visual C# 2008 Express Edition

Since last review was on VB 2008 Express we will now look a bit closer on Visual C# 2008 Express Edition.

The part called "Evolution of GUI" of our last review fits exactly also to the C# Express Edition - and also to the professional Editions (but there are more changes).

Also the project types are similar to VB Express.

The new WPF Designer Features fit to VB and C#.

So looking what's new in the Application Properties Tab.

Application Properties

Tab Application

There is a little surprise. The VB Version does not support changing the target Framework. If you expect that also for the C# Version you are wrong. Visual C# Express can do it!

But there is another surprise: No View 'UAC Settings button'. Since the UAC Settings are stored inside the application.manifest file I think you can easily get this functionality by using a text editor.

Except this there are no major changes in the application projects which are not in the VB Version. As the VB Version C# support now modifiers for resources and settings.

 

 

So you might ask: What is with .net's, c#'s and VB's new cool functionalities? You have not mentioned them in one word?

The answer is: This was a review of the IDE. .net Features are features of .net - nor of visual Studio. And also the language features are not depending on Visual Studio.

All three cases are worth for getting special reviews.

Opening Visual Studio 2008 Express Projects in Visual Studio 2008

1) Single projects (vbproj)

Here are no problems - open it in Visual Basic 2008 Express and then in Visual Studio 2005 (e. g. Standard Edition ) . Everything works.

2) Complete Visual Studio Solutions

If you open a Visual Studio 2005 Solution in Visual Basic 2008 Express Edition a conversion wizard is shown.

Im most cases only the solution file will be changed.

Here is an example of a converted file:

Microsoft Visual Studio Solution File, Format Version 10.00
# Visual Basic Express 2008
Project("{F184B08F-C81C-45F6-A57F-5ABD9991F28F}") = "Souvergin - RSS Reader", "Souvergin - RSS Reader\Souvergin - RSS Reader.vbproj", "{9EF163F6-8BFB-40A8-90ED-99DE4EA6A17C}"
EndProject
Global
    GlobalSection(SolutionConfigurationPlatforms) = preSolution
        Debug|Any CPU = Debug|Any CPU
        Release|Any CPU = Release|Any CPU
    EndGlobalSection
    GlobalSection(ProjectConfigurationPlatforms) = postSolution
        {9EF163F6-8BFB-40A8-90ED-99DE4EA6A17C}.Debug|Any CPU.ActiveCfg = Debug|Any CPU
        {9EF163F6-8BFB-40A8-90ED-99DE4EA6A17C}.Debug|Any CPU.Build.0 = Debug|Any CPU
        {9EF163F6-8BFB-40A8-90ED-99DE4EA6A17C}.Release|Any CPU.ActiveCfg = Release|Any CPU
        {9EF163F6-8BFB-40A8-90ED-99DE4EA6A17C}.Release|Any CPU.Build.0 = Release|Any CPU
    EndGlobalSection
    GlobalSection(SolutionProperties) = preSolution
        HideSolutionNode = FALSE
    EndGlobalSection
EndGlobal

This file can not be opened by Visual Studio 2005. But if you have also one of the full versions of Visual Studio like standard or professional you might want to work with them instead of an express edition.

So what is to change?

Only the first two lines:

Microsoft Visual Studio Solution File, Format Version 9.00
# Visual Studio 2005

Save your edited file and then you can work with Visual Studio 2005. Maybe in some cases it would be useful to save your backported Version as a separate file e. g. if you often switch between both IDE's.

Visual Studio Basic 2008 Express Edition

The first start

As in the past the first Visual Studio start requires some post setup configurations. I do not know why they are writing 'This might take a few minutes', but okay they will know what they do. In fact it need only a few seconds on my computer.

 

After configuration you will see the VS window with opened start page.

The evolution of GUI

On the first look you will see a few UI changes. The rounds are edges. While the old start page was filled with rounder edged - the new more modern looking design is more edged. The main areas in the start page are as before: MSDN feed, recent projects, getting started and Visual Basic Express Headlines.

The Menu has also redesigned.  The selected item is not only shown in a different background colour it gets a 3D Effekt

The active Tab gets a other back colour so if you have many files opened you can easier see where you are.

Creating a new Project

The formally included project types : Windows Forms Application, Class Libary and Console Application are extended by WPF Application and WPF Browser Application to meet the new features of .NET 3.5. The express Editions are limited to the .net Framework 3.5 - the can not build projects for .NET 2 and 3.0 like the full Visual Studio 2008 Versions. But such a feature is more interesting for professional Developers than hobbyists which the express editions are made for. If you want to develop .net 2 with Express Editions you have to Download the 2005 ones. But in most cases the .net 3.5 framework will be a good choose since it implement as far as I know all features of .net 2. 

Windows Forms Application

Business as usual  - everything is there where I was before. No real amazing changes except the 'Element Host'  for Windows Presentation Foundation Controls. This feature will as far as I think become important, since WPF will get more and more important. So a Control for hosting WPF inside a Windows Form is a good invention.

WPF Application / WPF Browser Application

Here you can not really speak of changes since the project type is completely new. Okay there was an Plug-in for allowing VS 2005 building WPF Projects but I was not as good as the real support in VS 2008.

The designer layout reminds me to the Visual Studio layout for web projects. You can view the visual designer in the top of the window and at the button the XAML Code. Other possibilities are: Only view XAML or only view the visual Designer. The right part with solution explorer and properties are like in other projects. But in XAML windows and for XAML Controls you are able so search after special properties.

 

Application Properties

Here are many changes compared to the past. This changes are not related to special project types.

Tab Application

"View UAC Setting"

Since Windows Vista introduced the User Account Protection (UAC) applications must be programmed in mind of this feature. So now you are able to configure easily the UAC requirements for your applications.

 

Tab Resources

Access Modifier for Resources. Now it is possible to select the public or friend modifier for all your Resources

Tab Settings

Access Modifier for Settings. Now it is possible to select the public or friend modifier for all your Settings.

Tab My Extensions

With this complete new feature you can easily add, view, or remove extensions to the My namespace.

Will be continued soon.

Visual Studio Express Editions Installation

Getting the express edition

Fist go to http://www.microsoft.com/express/ and then navigate to Download.

(the download page in Souvergin which is a browser I am working on) 

From this point on you have as in the past two way of installing VS Express Editions.

Web Install

In this case you select the version and language of your choose (At that time only English and Japanese are available). Then  your Browser will download a small installer file - e. g. 2,5 MB for Visual Basic Express Edition. The real Application Download is made during setup. You can use this way if you have a fast Internet Connection or do not need to install Visual Studio a few times - otherwise I would prefer the Offline installation.

Offline Install

By using the offline install you only select the language and then your Browser will download DVD Image with about 900 MB. This Version includes the  whole Express Suite. Containing all Express Editions. After Download you will have to burn the iso image on a DVD or mount it into a virtual DVD drive.

Installation

As in past the Visual Studio installer needs a long time for installing everything. Using WebInstall makes the setup even slower, because all files are downloaded while Setup. The setup time depend also on what you have already installed on your Computer. So if .NET FX 3.5, the SDK's MSDN and SQL Server is installed - maybe because if you have already another Express Edition on your PC, the Setup runs much faster.

 

Looking into the image: They set the wrong image transparent colour for the globe. Even really big companies make such little nasty mistakes - that happens not only to me -)

 

So next post of our VS 2008 Express Edition series is about Visual Basic 2008 Express Edition.

Visual Studio 2008 - Express Editions

In following entries we will focus on the new VS Express Editions and compare them to the predecessors. First we will start with Visual Basic's 2008 Edition followed by C#'s and C++'s and maybe we will also include Visual Web Developer (do not take that for granted, because this blog focuses on Windows Client Developement). Since J# is not a member of the Visual Studio 2008 family anymore we can not review anything about J# and VS 2008.