Desktop App Development in Visual Studio 11 Express
About two years ago Microsoft released Visual Studio 2010, and in doing so dropped support for the .NET Compact Framework, meaning that my flagship product here at work still has to be compiled in Visual Studio 2008. I posted about it at the time:
If we go by our historical turn-around in devices, I’m looking at being stuck with Windows Mobile until at least 2012, probably more like 2014.
I kind of feel like I’m stuck under water with Microsoft’s boot on my head.
Well, it's 2012 now and Microsoft hasn't shown me anything like a roadmap to get me off Windows Mobile 6 for industrial mobile data entry applications, so 2014 is looking optimistic indeed as a target date to abandon Visual Studio 2008.
So that's Microsoft pulling the rug out from under my work development environment.
Yesterday they did the same for my (future) home development environment.
From the Visual Studio 11 Express home page:
Visual Studio 11 Express for Windows 8 provides tools for Metro style app development. To create desktop apps, you need to use Visual Studio 11 Professional, or higher.
So as of Visual Studio 11, open source developers will have no way to create traditional Windows desktop apps unless they continue to use Visual C# 2010 Express.
I don't know what Microsoft are thinking. I guess they're trying to steer people towards developing Metro-style applications on Windows 8 and effectively deprecating traditional desktop apps. That's all well and good for new projects, but I have several free, open source desktop applications that I wanted to use Visual Studio 11 Express to further develop.
So there's me, still underwater with Microsoft's boot on my head.
Comments
# OJ
21/05/2012 9:02 AM
This is frustrating, no doubt about it. BUT, there are other options available to you. The IDE is one thing, the compiler and libraries are another. I'm sure you've heard this before, but I think it's worth mentioning anyway.
Abandon VS and use something else. There a _lot_ of tools out there which allow you to do the same thing. You could just as easily roll your own. VS is nice gloss over the tools you've already got installed. Sure it comes with a great debugger and whatnot, but for the most part you might not even need that.
I say take a bit of time to investigate the other tools and see what you could make work. If MS are indeed keen to push you away from VS, then let them do it. A man like yourself won't have any issues coming up with a tool chain that works. Best of all, you'll no longer be at the mercy of MS's licensing decisions ... other than ones specifically related to the .NET ecosystem.
# mabster
21/05/2012 9:06 AM
You're right, of course, OJ, in that I could just use the command line compiler etc and not need to worry about Visual Studio at all. Of course, Visual Studio 2010 will still work, and I much prefer that to no IDE at all. :)
# Calvin Allen
21/05/2012 9:25 AM
You *could* sign-up for a BizSpark account (there are a few restrictions, and a small fee due at the end of the term - negligible, really) - and get all the VS action you need.
# mabster
21/05/2012 9:36 AM
I'm an MVP, Calvin, so technically I have an MSDN licence and can use Visual Studio Ultimate.
However, I strongly believe that free software should be created with, and buildable by, free tools.
# OJ
21/05/2012 9:44 AM
+1 on the free software -> free tools point. Spot on. This is just another point that backs up MS's anti-open-source perception. It makes it hard for people in the MS community to create open source software that other people can build, use and contribute to without having to suffer the cost of huge license fees.
# Calvin Allen
21/05/2012 11:42 PM
Matt, I was unaware MVPs received that benefit - very nice.
Good point on the free software -> free tools point. Unfortunately, the people creating the free software aren't the same people creating the tools. Hopefully this is just a temporary thing from MS, in hopes of getting people to jump on the Metro bandwagon, and will change once VS goes RTM.