Visual Studio

Dec 13, 2019 After Visual Studio installation is complete, choose the Launch button to get started developing with Visual Studio. On the start window, choose Create a new project. In the search box, enter the type of app you want to create to see a list of available templates. Visual Studio Code is a code editor redefined and optimized for building and debugging modern web and cloud applications. Visual Studio Code is free and available on your favorite platform - Linux, macOS, and Windows.

• Visual Studio 2021

As featured in:

We are happy to announce the release of Visual Studio 2017. This release brings a new lightweight and modular installation experience which can be tailored to your needs.

Use Visual Studio 2017 to develop apps for Android, iOS, Windows, web, and cloud. Code fast, debug and diagnose with ease, test often, and release with confidence. You can also extend and customize Visual Studio by building your own extensions. Use version control, be agile, and collaborate efficiently with this new release.

Features:

• Tools and services for projects of any size or complexity
• C#, Visual Basic, F#, C++, Python, Node.js, and HTML/JavaScript
• Sprint planning
• Advanced debugging, automated and manual testing, and profiling
• DevOps with automated deployments and continuous monitoring

Code with confidence. Get help right where you need it.

Visual Studio guides you with live assistance as you write code, no matter what language you use, from C#/VB and C++ to JavaScript and Python.

IntelliSense describes APIs as you type and uses auto-completion to increase speed and accuracy. Quick Info tool tips let you inspect API definitions, and squiggly lines let you know about issues, often showing them as you type.

Navigate in context. Don’t lose your place as you explore.

Finding your way around in a large code base can be challenging. Visual Studio helps you find your way around more easily, without losing the context of the code or the markup you started from, with capabilities like Peek to definition, Navigate To, and Quick Find.

Enhanced Scrollbar’s 10,000 foot structural view of your code file lets you quickly pinpoint issues. See the object structure of your code easily with inline object browsing in the Solution Explorer, and quickly search for files in your solution.

Understand your code. The big picture, right where you are.

With Code Lens, there’s no need to leave your code to quickly understand its call structure and navigate to related functions. Code Lens goes much further. You can find out who last modified a method, or whether its tests are passing, all from right where you are in your code.

Fix issues quickly. Get to the heart of issues and find fixes.

Light bulb icons help you identify and fix common coding issues, in many cases “live” as you type your code, and take quick code actions (like refactoring, implementing interfaces and more) from right inside the editor.

What's New:

Visual Studio 2017 version 15.9.21 released March 10, 2020:

• Fixed a bug where the .NET Profiling tools couldn't be installed on non-enterprise versions of Visual Studio 2017 when using an offline installer.
• Fixed C++ compiler bug where a static_cast in a decltype would evaluate incorrectly. To minimize disruptions to existing codebases, in VS2017 this fix takes effect when the (newly added) /d1decltypeIdentityConversion switch is thrown.
• New Spectre mitigation options in C++ compiler: /Qspectre-load & /Qspectre-load-cf for speculative load hardening.

Develop: Navigate, write, and fix your code fast

• New Installation Experience - A reduced minimum footprint for faster and more customizable installations, as well as support for offline installs.
• Visual Studio IDE - A broad range of enhancements in Visual Studio 2017, including reduction in startup and solution load times, sign in and identity improvements, improved code navigation, open folder view, and connected services enable connections between your app and any service on-premises or in the cloud.
• Visual C++ - No breaking changes between 2015 and 2017. Better C++14 conformance level, CMake support, build throughput, and productivity in the editor.
• C# and Visual Basic - Extends support for new C# 7.0 and Visual Basic 15 language features, and introduces new refactorings that allow you to organize source code with one action.
• F# - Support for F# 4.1 language features, improvements to the F# compiler and FSharp.Core, and a new editor based on Roslyn Workspaces.
• JavaScript and TypeScript - TypeScript 2.1 is available for all TypeScript projects in Visual Studio. A new JavaScript language service is available and enabled by default.

Debug: Debug, profile, and diagnose with ease

• Debugging and Diagnostics - Overhaul of the Exception Helper and faster code navigation with Run to Click. Plus, a new summary of your application events in the Diagnostic Tools window and several improvements to the CPU Tool.

Test: Write high-quality code with comprehensive testing tools

• Live Unit Testing - Visualize unit testing results and code coverage live in the editor.
• Testing Tools - Associate automation with test case work items using the Test Explorer.

Collaborate: Use version control, be agile, and collaborate efficiently

• New Git features in Team Explorer and updated connect experience - Do more with Git in Visual Studio 2017 and easily find the projects and repos to which you want to connect.
• Enhanced Visual Studio Feedback Workflow - More collaborative Report-A-Problem. Search, follow, and vote to get latest updates on all feedback.

Extend: Customize to your liking by building your own extensions

• Visual Studio Extensions - Customize Visual Studio to your liking by building your own extensions.
• Discoverability of Project and Item Templates - There is a breaking change with how Visual Studio consumes project and item templates to improve performance of template discovery.

Equip: Utilize tooling to increase productivity and explore new capabilities

• .NET Core and ASP.NET Core - This contains the 1.0 final release of the new MSBuild based .NET Core Tools. Using Visual Studio 2017, you can create .NET Standard libraries, .NET Core apps/libraries, and ASP.NET web projects that use the new csproj format.
• Tools for Universal Windows App Development - Updates include a new version of the .NET Native toolchain, .NET Core NuGet framework, new productivity tools, and support for the Windows 10 'Creators Update' SDK.
• Xamarin - Xamarin 4.3 adds support for tvOS, while also improving iOS Assets Catalog support and the XML editing experience.
• Visual Studio Tools for Apache Cordova - A new browser-based simulator enables you to code fast and see the results immediately.
• Node.js Tools for Visual Studio - Updates focused on stability, performance, and overall product quality.
• Visual Studio Tools for Unity - Visual Studio Tools for Unity 3 is now available with the 'Game Development with Unity' workload from the new Visual Studio installer.
• Redgate Developer Tools Core Edition - To extend DevOps capabilities to SQL database development, Visual Studio now includes Redgate Developer Tools Core Edition, comprising Redgate ReadyRoll, SQL Search, and SQL Prompt.
• NuGet - NuGet now supports storing package dependency information directly in project files as package references, while maintaining the advances of transitive package references.
• Tools for XAML Apps - The XAML runtime toolbar now lets you track focus. XAML productivity has been improved with XAML Edit & Continue, improvements to the XAML Editor, and performance optimizations.
• Data Tools and SQL Server - The latest update of SQL Server Data Tools enables support for the newest features in Azure SQL Database and SQL Server 2016.
• Developer Analytics Tools - Visual Studio 2017 includes Developer Analytics Tools v8.6 with many improvements to the Application Insights and HockeyApp features in Visual Studio.
• Office Developer Tools for Visual Studio - Includes Office Developer Tools with the latest features and updates.
• Live Architecture Dependency Validation - Real-time notifications of dependency validation diagrams (aka Layer diagrams).
• Developer Command Prompt - Refactored scripts to support the new installation experience.
• Azure SDK for .NET - Now available from the new Visual Studio installer.

Visual Studio 2021

• 23 votes
  Developer tools and services for any platform with any language. IDE, DevOps, code editor & more.

  • Freeware
  • Windows
• 6 votes
  Visual Studio Code is a source code editor developed by Microsoft for Windows, Linux and macOS. It includes support for debugging, embedded Git control, syntax highlighting, intelligent code completion, snippets, and code refactoring.

  • Freeware
  • Windows/macOS/Linux
• 15 votes
  SharpDevelop is the open-source IDE for the .NET platform.

  • Freeware
  • Windows