Wearing my developer hat, I am super excited today on the launch (finally) of Visual Studio 2005, SQL Server 2005 & BizTalk Server 2006. I have been talking about the great features that .NET 2.0, ASP.NET 2.0, VS 2005 is bringing for last 2 years+. In fact, the first time I saw ASP.NET 2.0 nearly 3 years back during one of Microsoft’s selective early preview in Reading, UK. From that time I know that this platform is going to be huge jump for web developers worldwide.
The Microsoft critics in the Industry generally say that MS gets it right only in the “3rd” version of their software. This version of all three products marks their “3rd” version or higher:
- .NET Framework – 1.0, 1.1 & 2.0
- Visual Studio (After .NET) – 2002, 2003 & 2005
- SQL Server (100% of MS own codebase) – 7.0, 2000 & 2005
- BizTalk Server – 2000, 2002, 2004 & 2006
You can download a Free (until Nov 6, 2006) copy of any edition of Visual Studio 2005 Express from here. Enjoy!
BTW, I am doing this post as I am watching the live webcast of Steve Ballmer’s launch event in San Francisco, USA.